Redux: The Suspicion
by CeruleanSlane
Summary: Melissa and the other Animorphs have a new enemy. And it's a really, really small problem.
1. Chapter 1

So here we are. The first book with Melissa as a narrator, a non-original animorph. Let's see how it goes. Thanks for reading, everybody! I hope you like this as much as the previous books, and I hope that the non-canon narrator keeps your interest. Let's find out.

Chapter One

My name is Melissa. The others have said that they wrote my last name as being Chapman. I'll stick with that, but I can't promise that it's true. They changed things around to make it harder to find them. Actually, I guess I mean us. But they've been in danger a lot longer than I have. Well, I guess we're all in danger. The whole world is. They're just more in front of the danger. We are.

Sigh. Sorry, this is all new to me. When the others told me I should write, it seemed, umm, dangerous. But I guess they have a system. I've never written anything before, besides a school report I mean. So I don't know if I'm doing this right. Bottom line is, if you're new here, you should really read what the others have written first. Because if you're clueless, I don't know if I can clueify you.

Okay, I'll do my best. Let's start with the big one. Earth is being invaded by aliens. Yeah, from outer space. Still here? I'm going to assume you are since you just read this sentence. Unless you just read up to this sentence. But if you read this far, you're probably going to keep reading. I should explain before you give up.

You're probably wondering why you haven't seen anything on the news about any of this. There are two reasons for that. First, it's a quiet invasion. They're not flying around shooting down F-Whateverteens and blowing up the white house and being punched by Will Smith. They're infiltrating us, slowly but surely. Which brings me to the second reason you haven't seen this on the news. The news anchor might be one of the aliens. Or maybe it's the editor of the paper you read. Or the guy whose blog you read. Or the girl who drops off your paper in the morning. Or the… you get the idea.

The aliens are called yeerks. A yeerk is basically a little slug, about six inches long. They're blind and deaf and the entire race would be hard pressed to perform a hostile take over of your refrigerator. That is, if they didn't have one pretty huge advantage. You see, every yeerk, as helpless as it is, can slither into the ear of anything with a large enough brain, wrap themselves around it, and take over. When a yeerk crawls into a brain, they control that person completely. They make the person walk, talk, sit down, blink, everything. A person who is taken by a yeerk has absolutely no control. They're prisoners inside they're own mind. The yeerk can look through their memories at will, can read their lives like a book. When you're taken, you have no more rights. You're a slave of the yeerk.

So you see, they could be anyone. All those people you see every day, any of them could be a human-controller, a person who has been taken by the yeerks. They are infiltrating our world piece by piece, taking policemen, teachers, politicians, anyone they can, especially those in a position of power.

If you're waiting for me to tell you about the crack squad of flamethrower wielding cyborgian super-ninja marine sharpshooters we have opposing them, prepare yourself for disappointment. The only people on earth fighting the yeerks are four human teenagers, a bird who is sometimes a teenage boy, and an alien kid who fell asleep in class a lot. But! Before you go max out that credit card and say your good byes, we do have one pretty major advantage. If we can touch an animal, any animal, we can become it.

It's because of the Andalites. They're sort of the arch enemies of the yeerks. Picture a blue deer, only with a human torso, head, and arms. You're halfway there. Now give the deer a sort of furry scorpion-like tail with a wicked blade on the end. Then give him seven fingers on each hand instead of five. Finally, put a pair of eyes on top of his head that move around in any direction on these short stalks. No no, give him back the eyes in the normal spot too. They have four total. Now take away his mouth and nose. Replace them with three vertical slits that they use to breath through. Congratulations, that's an Andalite. If you're wondering how they talk without a mouth, they use what they call thought-speak, which is umm… speaking with thoughts.

Andalites fight the yeerks. Apparently they're fighting them all over the galaxy. They were fighting them on Earth, or in orbit anyway, but the yeerks ambushed the Andalite ship and pretty much beat the pants off of them. The Andalites will send reinforcements, but I guess they're spread so thin trying to deal with this invasion that it's going to take awhile. So for now, it's our job to hold back the entire yeerk empire. But you know, no pressure.

When the Andalites were being tpk'd, one of them, a warrior named Elfangor, crash landed on earth. He met my friend Rachel, her friend Cassie, her cousin Jake, his friend Marco, and this other kid from school named Tobias. I wasn't there, so I don't know exactly how it happened. I know Elfangor was dying. But before he did, he used this blue cube to give each of them the power that only Andalites had until that point, the power to touch an animal, acquire its dna, and then morph into that animal. I know you wish he'd given them a bazooka, but trust me, this way is actually better.

The morphing does come with a big restriction though. You can only morph for two hours. If you stay any longer than that, you're stuck in that form forever. That's what happened to Tobias. He stayed in his hawk morph for too long. Except he sort of got a 'get out of jail free' card. Actually, it was a 'get halfway out of jail for a favor' card. He helped this powerful creature called the Ellimist, who is sort of like Q I guess, and got his morphing power back. Only now his default form is hawk instead of human. Somehow, he even got his old human body back as a morph. So he could morph into a human and stay that way, but then he could never morph again. Personally, I don't know how he resists. I don't know if I could.

Elfangor died after he gave them the morphing power, and the blue box was lost. At least, it was lost for awhile. Then I found it. Shortly after that, I found out the truth about the yeerks and everything else when I saw Rachel in midmorph. That was freaky. And seeing Ax didn't help. His real name is something like Facsimile Escargot Is Still, but everyone calls him Ax. He's an Andalite cadet that the others rescued. He's trapped here on earth. He was in his own body when I saw him the first time. Like I said, freaky. But they told me the truth, and with the kind of proof they had, it was easy to believe.

Besides, when I say that anyone can be a controller, I don't say it just to scare you. I say it because it's true. Whenever I see anyone now, I wonder if they have a yeerk inside their head. Everyone I talk to, I have to think, are they trying to take over Earth? Would they kill me if they knew what I knew, or would they just trap me and enslave me? I walk around and think about these things, because it's easier than thinking about the controllers that I already know. Specifically, my parents. Both of them were taken by the yeerks a long time ago.

For a long time, I didn't know what was wrong. I thought I did something to make them mad. I thought they gave up on me. I thought they wanted someone else. They were so interested in everyone else and always going out to these games and these parties and meetings. But they never took me with them. Actually, half the time I think they forgot I existed. Most of the time I got my own meals, got my own homework done, and got myself to my gymnastics practices. Heck, I even had to remind myself to do my own chores. After awhile, it wasn't like they were mad at me. It was like they didn't care one way or another. I was a goldfish that figured out how to pour its own food. If I died, they might make a sad face while flushing me down the toilet. It's not a good feeling.

So I probably don't need to explain why I was so ready, and so happy to believe that something like this was happening. When I heard that my parents weren't my parents, that they were taken over by aliens and that somewhere inside, my mom and dad were still who I remembered, I would have believed anything else they wanted me to. See, in a way, they thought they were telling me, 'your life is in danger, the whole world is being invaded, there are aliens who want to enslave you and everyone you know.' What they were actually telling me was, 'Your parents still love you and you can save them.' So if you ever wonder why I agreed to get into this, why I volunteered to fight when the last altercation I was actually in was in second grade, that's why. Because even though I failed to get my pencil back from the kid who sat behind me, I will free my parents. As terrible of a battle oath as that is. I really need a new one.

Pretty soon after I found out the truth, Cassie disappeared. It's a long story and the others are better at telling it. Basically, now she works for the Ellimist, and she's moved on from this world. So, I guess in a way, it's really hard not to think of myself as a replacement. I can't help but think that when the others look at me, they wonder if Cassie would have said something better, or done the right thing faster. But really, all I can be is me. And well, any animal I touch, but still me. I'm Melissa. Not Cassie 2.0. Maybe I'll do the right thing and maybe I'll do the wrong thing. But whatever I do, it's me.

What I was doing at the moment was sitting cross legged on my bed, petting my cat, Fluffer McKitty, and watching Firefly. I was wondering if Andalite ships looked that cool, when my dad walked in. Or rather, the yeerk piloting my father's body steered him into my room.

It was all I could do to smile and ask, "Do you need something, daddy?"

For a second, I didn't think he heard me. His gaze was fixed on the screen, where Wash was using the ship to break up a suddenly lethal bar fight. His eyes narrowed, and then, as though accessing what the ship he was seeing was from my real father, he visibly eased. "Ah." Finally, his attention turned to me. I felt like a bug under his gaze. Since I've actually been a bug a couple times, so I had to look down and make sure I wasn't really becoming one again.

I guess Fluffer felt the tension in the room, because he squirmed until I put him down, then ran straight out of the room. How I envied him. Reluctantly, I forced a smile once more and looked back up to my father expectantly.

He watched the cat run out with a thoughtful expression before speaking distractedly. "Your mother and I are leaving. We'll be back after midnight."

I blinked. "Okay."

He nodded once before walking out. That was it. No telling me to get to bed on time. No teasing me about wanting to know where they were going. No reminding me not to eat junk food. Nothing. He just left. A minute later I heard the front door open and close. Walking to my window, I could see the car start to pull out of the driveway. Then I frowned. My mother was driving, but I didn't see my father anywhere. That meant he was still in the house and didn't want me to know. That had to mean yeerk secrets that we really should know.

I spent a minute trying to decide what to do. If he was still in the house when he was supposed to be gone, he had to be down in the basement. If he was anywhere else, I could have accidentally run into him. But I'm not allowed in the basement. Of course, that meant that the top two floors were safe.

I thought about calling Rachel, but what would I tell her? I didn't know for sure that anything important was happening. My luck, I'd get her and whoever she dragged into it over here and it would turn out that he was sorting the yeerk empire's drive-thru receipts for tax purposes. I had to at least find out if this was important.

So, I needed a little morph, one that could get around easily and not be seen. It wasn't a hard choice, since I don't have that many morphs. But I couldn't do it here. It would take too long to try to find the right place once I was tiny. Instead, I cracked my bedroom door and looked around before quietly easing my way out.

It's really helpful when you live in a house most of your life. You learn where all the creaky floor spots are. I avoided them and carefully moved down the stairs into the kitchen. The dishwasher was running, and the door into the basement was closed, as usual. I pressed my ear to the door, but didn't hear anything. I was going to have to get small and get down there.

Quickly, I slid my pants and shirt off. You can't morph anything more than skintight clothing, like the leotard I wore under my clothes. Anything else gets left behind. That's pretty much why we must be the only teenagers in the world who have never asked for a cell phone. We'd just lose them. And it would look a little weird if my dad came out and found my clothes lying right in front of the door to the basement. I put them in the clothes hamper next to the laundry room, and then looked around one more time before concentrating.

Other than the energy it takes out of you, morphing is surprisingly easy. All I had to do was think about the animal I wanted to become and focus on it, and the changes started. The first thing that happened was the wings. Huge gossamer wings sprouted from my back. They were human sized. That's the weird thing about morphing. It's never logical. It never follows any kind of pattern. You might grow some enormous things that should be small before everything shrinks down to size. Or if you're changing into something big like an elephant, you might get a human sized trunk first. It's all random.

When the wings appeared, I looked over my shoulder at them. They were easy to flutter, but doing so knocked some papers off the table. I started to go pick them up, but the changes were continuing. I put my arms out, and they turned black, like they were being burnt off. Then most of the muscle seemed to dissolve as each arm split into two and started to shrink. It was disgusting. I was reeling from that sight when my legs were suddenly incapable of supporting me. They were shrinking as fast as my arms, and I pitched forward with a yelp. Luckily, by the time I hit the floor, enough of me had shrunk that I was fairly sure my dad wouldn't hear it below.

Squirming on the floor with a mostly human, if really small torso, I focused on continuing the morph. I got smaller and smaller, and equally more disgusting. Finally, my vision completely split into an odd kaleidoscope of images that took a lot of work to try to sort out, and I was done. I had become the common housefly.

It may seem weird, but the housefly was one of my favorite morphs. That's because for as disgusting as it is, the fly does one thing really well. It, well you know, flies. As soon as I was completely morphed, I shot off the floor and into the air. One millisecond, a thought, that's all it took and I was airborne. I shot straight up, doing ninety, ummm… yards an hour.

I did a few quick loops and spins as the fly. I couldn't help it. They're just so utterly and completely free. They don't move through the air, they dance in it. A fly in the air is like one of those Olympic figure skaters on the ice. They totally own it.

But there was work to do, and no one was here to remind me to do it. So I had to remind myself, and focus. Gradually, I pointed the pathetic and confusing multiple image compound fly eyes at the door. I had morphed right next to it, but it still took me a couple minutes to figure out where exactly it was with the pathetic fly vision. Once I located the door, it was easy to land on it and find the crack at the bottom that let me crawl underneath and into the basement itself.

After I made it into the basement, I just kept flying lower. The place was dark and I had no idea where I was going. But I hoped something would direct me before I got completely lost and had to demorph. Luckily, there was a guide in the form of my father's voice. I could hear him somewhere ahead of me, and flew that way.

Ahead, I could see a line of light from a door that wasn't quite fully closed. It was the secret room that I wasn't supposed to know about, the one that my father used to talk to Visser 3, the leader of the yeerk invasion on earth. He hadn't bothered to close the door all the way. I guess that was because he'd hear me coming if I opened the door and walked down into this place that I was forbidden to enter anyway.

Once I got inside the little communications room, I planned on sticking my butt (or whatever flies have), to the ceiling and waiting to hear what was happening. It didn't exactly work out that way. First, it was a good thing I actually was a fly because if I'd been human I would have fallen over when the first thing I heard upon entering the room was a thought-speak voice.

(Insignificant yeerk bottom feeding cretin! You will give us the energy we demand or feel the unyielding crush of our imperious boots upon your whimpering bodies! You will tremble in terror before the sound of our all mighty weapons as they reduce entire fleets to atoms. You will beg and plead for mercy but find none if you do not shower us with that which we seek!)

Ummm, that wasn't a yeerk. The only yeerk to have thought-speak was Visser 3, the only Andalite-Controller. And besides, no way he'd talk like that. Oh, he'd threaten my father like that, he just wouldn't put down the rest of the Yeerk Empire. Andalites? Maybe, but it didn't sound like them. They sounded like bullies. It was hard for me to think of the only real hope for the Earth as bullies. Call me hopeful. Besides, if the Andalites were here, no way my dad would be dealing with them on his own. No, this had to be something else.

Then I saw it. Sitting on the desk as I flitted wildly behind my father's head was a tiny alien ship. It looked like a model. The whole thing was maybe four inches long, shaped sort of like a baton with six tubes at one end in clusters of three, each trio spaced evenly around the thing. At the other end was some kind of death head shape that I took to be the bridge. At a guess, the thought-speak was coming from there. Was that possible? Could there be aliens that tiny? I wished the others were here, especially Ax. He'd know what this was.

My father rubbed his forehead and sighed. I guess he was having a bad day. That made me like the aliens a little more. His voice was strained. "I told you. If you locate the morphing energy on this planet, and help us track it, we will repair your engines."

Okay, that was bad. Track morphing energy? That meant track us. They wanted these little aliens, whoever they were, to point them in our direction. If they did that, it was going to get a lot harder to stay hidden. I had to tell the others.

The aliens didn't seem to like what they were told. (Fool! No one lives who dares believe they who wallow in the mud of their ancestors can do more before the orders of the Glorious Helmacron Fleet than beg for their lives and shower our supreme Over-selves with all of their meager possessions!) There was a pause, as though they were debating internally. (However! In the interest of leaving the yeerk dregs with what meager power they have for the time of our great battles, when we shall purge the galaxy of all who fail to grovel at our feet, we will find this energy you seek!)

My father started to lean forward, as I began to get a bad feeling. "Good. You will—"

(It is behind you.)

The answer was simple, to the point. It took my father a moment to process it. It only took me half a moment. Then I spun around in the air and made for the exit. As I did that, he got it, shouting. "Door close!"

At his command, the door slammed shut. I nearly bounced off it before skimming up the side, frantically searching for an exit. My father was leaping, trying to grab me out of midair, but the fly was too fast. I darted between his fingers and went for the ceiling. Crap! The room was sealed. There was no way out of here! All he had to do was call reinforcements, or simply wait two hours. I'd rather demorph than be stuck as a fly for the rest of my life.

Then, as though the bad situation needed to get worse, the tiny ship lifted into the air from the desk. I guess the Helmacrons wanted to join in the fun. (We will destroy the source of the energy and you will give us what we demand!) As the shout came, a little bolt of laser energy shot out from the ship. I say little in relation to being human sized. To a fly, it was enormous. The laser nearly blasted my left wing off!

Instantly, I shot away from my perch on the ceiling. My father circled below, waiting to grab at me if I came anywhere near. The Helmacron ship was in hot pursuit, firing laser after laser through the air while he bellowed at them to stop so they could catch me alive. I felt like an X-Wing, dodging left, right, left, down, left around their shots. The fly was fast, but so were they, and sooner or later, I'd make a mistake.

It looked like I was going to have a lifetime fight record of 0 and 2.


	2. Chapter 2

Hey guys! I'm really glad you like the first chapter of this story.

Marcus, don't count out the whole shrink-ray yet just because the blue box isn't around. There are other power sources and I'd be crazy not to use that plot point. Half the point of the Helmacron books are the shrinking aspect. I'll explain it somehow, I promise. ;)

Also, about Melissa's sci-fi references, it's just the way I've expanded her character to be. The great thing about her being so utterly ignored in the original series is that I can flesh her out almost any way that I feel like without violating some kind of canon. This is the first time you're getting a look at this aspect of her because it's the first time her narration has been seen in this series. It would have been a little odd if the only other person who would know her well enough, Rachel, suddenly mentioned in her own narration 'Oh by the way, Melissa enjoys science fiction movies and is a big geek'. On the other hand, Melissa did understand Marco's Buffy reference, so it's not THAT surprising. :) But I'm glad you enjoy it all the same.

Loveforwriting, hehehe, thanks. Somehow, writing the summary is always one of the hardest parts for me. I'm glad you liked the pun.

Jay, thanks a lot. I wanted to write Melissa doing a solo bit at the start to get more of a personal insight into her character, and I hoped that people wouldn't be annoyed at not seeing the canon animorphs immediately.

Ani-maniac494, I'm liking Melissa so far too, but then, I'm writing her. So it's great to hear that someone else enjoys reading her thoughts. I'm glad other people appreciated her goldfish comparison and the simultaneously funny/sad aspect of it.

Meiza, I'm really glad you like the joke on Ax's name. That whole bit made me laugh when it came to me, and I knew I had to use it. Hearing that it made someone else laugh is great. Awesome to hear you're still reading.

Belle, that sucks about your poor laptop. But I'm glad you can still read and keep up. Life is just fine for me right now, thank you. Being sick wasn't fun, but I'm totally over it. So review whenever you get a chance, no problem. I like reading your thoughts. Good luck with the computer thing.

Kqts, wow, four hours? I feel so loved. ;) Thanks, but don't fall too behind on the other things you have to do. Just fall a little behind, that's compliment enough.

Everyone, I think it's really great and promising that you like the story so far and the narration. This is a tough experiment considering how different it is to use a brand new narrator. I hope it works out. Thank you so much for the reviews. I hope I meet your expectations.

For now, please enjoy the chapter. I'll see you next time. Peace.

Chapter Two

O Great and Mighty Eternal Emperor of the Universe! Your servants aboard the feared Galaxy Blaster, whose name is whispered by her enemies in much terror, wish to inform you that we have struck a deal with the cursed yeerks. They will provide us with the resources to fix our damaged engines so that we may once again scour the stars and strike fear and self loathing into the souls of our enemies, which of course the yeerks are. In return, we will find these change-capable beasts they wish to capture. But we will capture them ourselves and then the yeerks will be forced to exchange more than repairs. They will be forced to exchange their own freedom and will become our slaves! But of course, we haven't told them that part yet. Also, the cowards aboard the Planet Crusher have failed utterly and have absolutely nothing to do with our great success.

--- From the log of the Helmacron ship, Galaxy Blaster.

Remember how I said being a fly was fun?

TSEEEWW! TSSEEEW! (Destroy the flying heathen mud wallower! Fire on the primitive scum descendant of mar'leks! It will fear and tremble before the power of the Helmacrons!) TSEEEW! TSEEEW!

I was seriously considering changing my mind.

Someone was screaming. It was probably me, since the helmacrons were busy ranting about my boiled blood and deep fried kidneys or some such and my father was still frantically demanding that they stop shooting at me. I honestly think if I hadn't been so busy dodging laser blasts that would have incinerated my poor little winged self that I would have made the mistake of thanking him.

I also wanted to tell the Helmacrons to pick on someone their own size, but considering the size of their ship, they probably were.

What was I doing?! What was I thinking?! I couldn't do this stuff. I was just a kid. I couldn't fight against an alien invasion. I was about to be atomized by something that looked like it should have come packaged in a box with an action figure and accompanying three pm cartoon!

Okay, Melissa. Calm down. Just think. TSEEEEW! Dodge and think. What would Rachel do? Charge. Okay, bad example.

What would umm… Jake do? Have a plan to get out of the situation in the first place. Why couldn't I have started out in Jake-thought?

What would Tobias do? Make an ironic comment, and then find out that the alien overlord is his aunt's sister's cousin's daughter and be so emotionally whipped that he does a Rambo-Fly shouldbekamakazi special forces death dive attack and somehow ends up winning in the end. A: I'm not that lucky. And B: Unfortunately, I know all my relatives. Stupid family reunions and their ruining potential dramatically appropriate, karmic fueled adrenaline rushes.

What would Ax do? Scornfully comment on the Helmacron's primitive technology by Andalite standards. Unfortunately, it looked pretty fancy from where I was sitting.

Okay, so what would Marco do? Make a joke, and then scream that we were all going to die before pulling something brilliant out of his butt. I'm not brilliant and I usually spend so long thinking about a joke that by the time I get around to telling it, everyone's moved on through three other subjects. But other than my developing precognition or an alien intelligence, it was my best choice.

There was one good thing during all this. The Helmacrons had what was apparently hilariously terrible aim. It probably came from the fact that most of their targets are at least 50 times bigger than their ship, so they don't have exactly have to be crack shots to hit anything. That said, the experience was terrifying and there was always the chance of a lucky shot.

I gritted my teeth. I mean… metaphorically. Think like Marco. Think like Marco. (I'm gonna die.) I wasn't sure if that was so much thinking like Marco as being honest with myself, but hey, two birds.

The next shot came in close on my right side as I skimmed the left wall. I broke to that side through the still sizzling air as the next shot, a second behind the other, incinerated the space where I had been. They were closing in, herding me to the corner where I wouldn't be able to keep moving. Their shots were getting better as they adjusted. That or I was getting predictable.

Think like Marco! I suddenly yelled, almost desperately. (You think I'm bad? The big wallower over there said that the Helmacrons were weak and smelled like poo!)

The shots ceased briefly. The aliens seemed to be debating this with each other before one of them asked, almost curiously. (What is this poo?)

Tobias gets a reunion with his mother. I get to explain poo to this race of microscopic napoleons. I have never been more convinced that seniority in this group comes with benefits.

At least they had stopped firing. That was a definite plus. My father had also stopped yelling at them and was looking at the ship suspiciously. He seemed to have lost exact sight of me for the moment. He was talking urgently into his cell phone, so I figured I had to get out of here really fast. That meant thinking even faster. Which really isn't me. I like to have time to think over every option a few times.

When the Helmacrons repeated their demand to know what poo was, I sighed before hesitantly explaining. As soon as the alien pipsqueaks were clear on what went where and why, their ship instantly performed a 180. My father looked up with an expression of surprise as the four inch ship charged straight at him, screaming. (The poo is you, bloated one! The poo is you!)

As far as war cries went, it was only marginally better than 'You're stupid! I'm telling!' And their shots seemed to be doing little more than annoying my father as he cursed and yelled for them to stop. Still, they were distracting him, which was the point. It was time to execute phase two of the plan that I had dubbed 'Dear God I Am Insane And Will No Doubt Perish Horribly'. I was later told by Marco that that plan name has been trade marked and was around version five hundred and twenty seven by the time I got around to it.

While my father was pivoting and swatting at the ship, which was circling his head and firing repeatedly, I flew down behind the desk where his communications computer was set up. I landed on the dusty, dim floor while listening while the two races of superior alien overlords fought over who, exactly in this particular situation, was poo.

Then I started to demorph. I assume you now have a full appreciation of the name of this plan. I was hidden behind the desk, but that wouldn't last. But I absolutely had to stay out of my father's sight while I was demorphed. If he saw who I was, or if he even saw that I was human and not Andalite, I'd ruin everything. I silently cheered for the Helmacrons to be as annoying as possible. Not that they needed the encouragement.

I managed to demorph completely while staying hidden. In the dim lighting, I glanced around and squirmed deeper into the corner. There was a five foot space in the top right corner, still covered by the long table, where some weird instrument panel was. I ignored the flashing lights as well as my father saying some words that I had never heard him say before and that I certainly know I would have gotten in trouble for saying. Crouching down, I took a few breaths before starting the next morph. Morphing can be tiring. Morphing too rapidly is like doing a bunch of wind sprints in gym. The others always seemed less put off by doing a few morphs than I was. I guess it's like a muscle. They've been using theirs so much more than I had that they were faster and could do more before being exhausted.

As soon as I began the morph, I started ballooning out. I went from being around a hundred pounds to being three times that in a few seconds. I looked down at my bloated self and winced. Not just because of the unattractive idea of being three hundred pounds, but because none of my human features had changed yet. Come on, come on. Change color. Change my nose. Change everything. I had a small space to work with and I had to be as different as possible by the time my dad noticed.

Next, all my hair schloooped back into my scalp, leaving me bald, even as my skin began to turn a sickly gray. I muttered under my breath. "Oh this is attractive." I looked like Danny DeVito's corpse. Even as I wondered how much I resembled myself still, the point became moot as my eyes and nose slid upwards and back, leaving my face behind to move to the top of my head, which then being to elongate with my eyes near the back and my nose on the front. The nostrils then separated while my ears passed my eyes and slid into place somewhat above and behind them.

My fingers fused and there was a grinding noise inside my head as my skull continued to reshape itself. Morphing is one of those things where it should hurt, but for some reason it doesn't. I guess the Andalites figured that if this was supposed to be a super-spy sort of thing, having someone screaming and sobbing as their body completely reshaped itself would be somewhat detrimental.

Within a few more seconds, my body was too big for the space behind the desk. Thankfully, I was also too far morphed to be recognized as human. I stopped shrinking back against the wall and let myself fall forward. There was a loud crash as the desk spun away while I finished growing. The sound made my father and the Helmacrons both stop yelling at each other and look my way. What they saw was a nearly 2,000 pound, almost eight foot long hippopotamus. That eight feet became ten feet, then twelve, even as my father stared in confusion, then sudden anger as well as a bit of fear. "You're not going anywhere, Andalite scum!"

I would have replied, but I was busy growing. He reached for a dracon weapon, which is sort of like a laser pistol and I had no idea why he hadn't shot the Helmacrons with it. Probably because his boss had a plan for the little creeps and you didn't mess with Visser 3's plans if you wanted to keep living. He had no such issue with shooting me though, so I lunged forward. The morph wasn't done yet, but it was close enough. He yelled and leapt away, abandoning the weapon as my bulk crashed into the metal door he had been standing in front of. I was close to three thousand pounds by then, and fifteen feet long, almost too big for the room.

(Catch the larger beast! It will learn to serve its masters!) The Helmacrons were over their surprise and had begun shooting once more. If the shots had been little more than annoying to a human, they were nothing to a hippo. Finally, I had completed the morph, finishing at almost four thousand pounds and sixteen feet in length. A hippo, despite the jokes associated with it, is not an animal to be played with. The larger bull hippos, which I was, have four huge front canine teeth, two on top and two on bottom, which they use for fighting. The teeth can get to be about three feet long as the mouth can open to about four feet wide. They're also faster than humans. Imagine something that's sixteen feet long, four thousand pounds coming at you with a four foot yawning mouth with three foot teeth at thirty miles per hour. Now imagine it's not a Tyrannosaurus, but a hippopotamus. Suddenly the idea of becoming a hippo to fight isn't quite so silly. Which is exactly why I had chosen it for my combat morph. The idea of me fighting was so strange and kind of funny that I wanted an animal that would be seen as just as unlikely, but would end up being very dangerous and very effective. Call it hope in myself.

I heard crashing and shouting on the other side of the door. The other yeerks had arrived. I just prayed that the Visser wasn't among them yet. My father shouted for them to stop me and opened the door. Two heavy, imposing bladed Hork-Bajir filled the doorway. At least, they would have been imposing if I hadn't been in full hippo morph. To the hippo mind, these creatures were stopping it from getting where it wanted to go. That's not a position you want to be in, because an angry hippo is one of the most dangerous animals on the planet. They can knock over trucks that make the mistake of coming between them and where they want to go, or just because they're annoyed. Two animals less than a third of its size meant nothing.

WHUMPH! I lunged forward into the surprised Hork-Bajir. They went down as easily as the wall itself around the doorway, and I was suddenly in the open room of the basement itself. I had trampled over the poor Hork-Bajir, and the wall behind me had caved in from me tearing through it, blocking my father from sight for a moment. I had to hurry.

There was a human in the basement as well, but he took one sight of the enormous creature bursting through the doorway and wall like a deranged Kool-Aid Man and ran back up the stairs. Wait… stairs. Awww crap. You see what I mean about needing longer to think about these plans?

The hippo had been my best shot at getting out of the room, but now it was a problem. There was no way I was going to get this four thousand pound beast up the stairs and out of the house. I began to demorph as quickly as I could, even as I moved to the base of the stairs. The second I was small enough to fit on the steps, I began to squirm and heave myself up them. Behind me, I could hear my father yelling for them to clear the rubble that was blocking him.

Moving up the stairs gradually became slightly easier as I became a several hundred pound beast instead of a several thousand pound one. I was nearly to the top of the stairs when I heard company arrive in the form of the tiny ship. The Helmacrons were as persistent as they were annoying.

(Destroy the beast! Make it grovel and beg for its miserable existence! All humans and change-beasts will serve the Helmacrons! The Galaxy Blaster will obliterate all who oppose us and the miserable failures on the Planet Crusher will explain why they have pathetically failed!)

Their shots stung the back of my neck as I shrank down to myself, annoying me into yelping. "Ow! Come on, you idiots. You're not hurting me because I'm bigger than you! Your ship is like the size of my hand!"

The shots instantly ceased, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe they could be reasoned with. Maybe-- There was a sudden flash of green light. I didn't know what it was, but I didn't want to find out. My dad could get out of that room at any moment. There could be more yeerks on their way. I had to climb faster!

I kept climbing, but something weird was happening. Every step seemed to be harder to climb than the last. Every stair seemed to be getting bigger and further apart. At first I thought it was my paranoia and fear. Then I realized it wasn't just me. Or rather, it was me. I was getting smaller. Not just demorphing smaller. I'd reached my normal size before this, but then I just kept on shrinking. The steps were big enough that I had to stretch my legs to reach the next one, and by the next step I had to reach up and pull myself over it like a fence. Finally, by the top step, it wasn't going to happen. The stair loomed over me, the size of a house. I couldn't help it. I screamed.

The Helmacrons sounded immensely pleased with themselves. (Neep! Neep! Now you are not so proud of your terrible bloated bulk! You will serve us and feel our wrath as you writhe in your unending humiliation as our pitiable slave!)

"What did you do?!" I screamed at them. "What did—Bloated? Hey, I weigh ninety eight pounds you dorks!" I paused and flinched. "I mean… usually. Put me back! Change me back!" By now, the stair ahead of me was the size of a skyscraper. There was a bit of dirt next to me that was as big as a basketball.

Instead of listening, the ship, which wasn't nearly so laughable any more, hovered over me. I heard a crash from below as my father finally managed to get himself free. But that was the least of my problems, because I suddenly found myself lifted into the air and pulled toward the Helmacron ship. They had some kind of tractor beam! They don't understand poop but they have a tractor beam?! How fair is that?

I struggled and fought it, but I had no leverage in midair and the pull was strong. Before I could think of trying to morph something larger than I was to hopefully overweigh the ship's beam, I was taken inside. Just as the hatch opened to admit me, I got a brief glimpse of my father rushing up the stairs, lunging for the ship. But the Helmacrons shot upwards and flew away. Meanwhile, I was yanked inside by the beam and dropped onto a metal floor.

I looked up to find myself in some kind of hangar. There were fighters filling the hangar, maybe a dozen of them. Under normal circumstances, they'd be the size of flies. Now they were about the size of normal fighter jets. At this scale, the Helmacrons were a lot more imposing.

In front of me stood four of what I assumed were the Helmacrons themselves. They were roughly humanoid, but they had two sets of legs instead of one. They wore these silvery suits like you see in old sci-fi movies. Their heads looked like inverted pyramids, large and flat on the top with a hooked chin. Their eyes looked like big green marbles, sitting seemingly precariously on top of their heads. Instead of a human mouth, they had insect-like mouthparts with sideways teeth. It was, in a word, disturbing.

But far more disturbing were the guns, probably similar to dracon weapon, that they held. The one in front pointed. (Debloated one! You will come to see that we have already captured another of the humans who also holds the change-power! You will realize that all hope is lost and that you should give up all of your knowledge and beg to be our slave, our beast of burden so that we might spare your miserable existence!)

"Another?!" I yelped. They had already caught someone? Who? Was it Rachel? Jake? Did they find Marco? I didn't think it was Ax, since they said human. Which gave me another temporary heart attack in hoping they didn't mention that fact to the yeerks. "Who? Who did you attack?"

The Helmacrons cheered. (Neep! Neep! The human beast is afraid! We will grind the planet under our boots and gnash their pitiful existence in our teeth!)

Then the one who had spoken before pointed. (You see? The other change-humans thought to defeat us, to deny our rightful place and our new prisoner! But we have defeated them and claimed our prize. Now we have two such prisoners. The planet will sob beneath our unimaginable power!)

They had attacked the others and taken one of them? Were they okay? Was Rachel all right? What had I missed? I turned to see three Helmacrons herding someone toward us. Then I gasped when I saw which morph-capable human they had captured.

Hearing my gasp, the Helmacron prisoner looked up. Then he smiled, despite the situation. His smile was almost rueful. "Hey, Melissa."

I stared, my mouth open as a soft, almost whimper escaped. "… David…"


	3. Chapter 3

Hey guys, slightly shorter chapter this time out. I promise Chapter Four gets back with the other Animorphs. It was going to happen this chapter, but the whole thing just kind of… didn't go that route. I could have made it longer and gotten back to them, but it would have taken too long, and it just flows better on its own with the 'reunion' part of the next chapter. Thanks for going with me on Melissa's first solo outing. I really think it helps to get closer to her character and shows her personality. I hope you enjoy it.

Marcus, thanks for your reviews. You tend to get in depth both with what's good and what could improve, and I thank you for that, because it really does help me. I'm glad you liked the ridiculousness of Melissa's poo situation.

Thanks to everyone who reviews and especially to those who enjoy Melissa's characterization. I hope you continue to do so in this chapter. It's these first few chapters that I think have helped me to finally really GET Melissa's character, and hopefully you'll feel the same way. I need to hurry up here, because I'm already late for dinner and I wanted to get this chapter up but I do want to address Mickiept's concerns about the modern day references. Basically, because I'm writing the story NOW, I'm setting it in the time period of NOW. Because the Animorphs were generally good about not revealing specific dates, I think it still works.

I'll get more personal responses out next time, so please, keep the reviews coming and let me know what you think. Both good and bad.

Chapter Three

David. The only non-animorph human with the morphing technology. If you don't know who he is, I'll give you a brief overview. He's a jerk.

I got Rachel to tell me the whole story of what happened with David, how he lost his parents and his home. I heard about how he turned against them, how maybe they pushed him too hard, too fast. But as guilty as Rachel felt, as guilty as they all feel, I don't think it's their fault. David is just… bad. You really need to read the other's accounts to understand the full jerkitude of his jerkness, but let me assure you. It is epic. Picture Sauron as a whiny, emo teenager.

I know that doesn't seem all that imposing. But that's the thing that makes it a good comparison. Because David does not seem that dangerous, that disturbed, at first glance. Heck, he's even kind of cute, in that withdrawn, loner kind of way. He looks like any other resentful teenaged boy. You know, when he's not transforming into a six-legged lion with mechatitanium motorized death teeth to eat your face off.

Even discounting his morphing, David is probably the single greatest threat to the whole war against the yeerks. He knows who the Animorphs are. He knows where they live. He knows everything. With a single phone call, he could destroy the Animorphs, and the Earth's chances of survival. If he thought the yeerks would protect him, he'd probably do it in a heart beat. That's why he was supposed to be under watch with the Chee. The Chee are sort of like Vulcans, if Vulcans were super high tech alien androids from another planet whose creators were destroyed, leaving them alone on Earth with only their pacifistic programming and powerful holographic disguises for company. So, nothing like Vulcans except the alien part.

I really need to work on my analogies if I'm going to keep writing. So far, I've got you picturing a bunch of Spocks watching over a giant floating eye with acne.

When David smiled at me, I said a word that will never be in any school spelling bee. Then I said it again. If you don't understand my potty mouth, you obviously still haven't read those previous accounts.

I took a step back and bumped into the helmacron behind me. Turning, I saw the thing's constantly gnashing sideways teeth and the bulbous eyes perched on top of its upside down pyramid head. Looking back to David's innocent smile, I decided he creeped me out more and stayed by the helmacron.

Honestly, I had no idea what I was going to do. These creeps may have been small enough to demolish a regiment with a flyswatter, but for the moment, so was I. At least I hoped it was for the moment. I wouldn't let myself think about what it would be like if I couldn't go back to being my normal self. Yeah, I'm not that tall to begin with, but this was ridiculous.

"Melissa." David repeated while putting his hand out like he expected me to shake it. "Good to see you. You never visit." The image he chose to display using his new chee body's holographic projector was innocent. I didn't trust it any more than I believed I could reach up and poke Ashton Kutcher in the eye on my tv screen for being a giant ham. When I didn't speak, he lowered his hand and chuckled slightly. "You know I can't hurt you any better from here than I could from the bottom of the Chee fortress."

I should have said something dismissive. I should have insulted him. Probably any of the others would have had a whole list of withering things they could have said just then. I stayed quiet. The truth was, I was too scared to spit out anything just then, and if I tried to speak, I would have sounded like Minnie Mouse. It doesn't matter what you say in Minnie Mouse voice, people will not be impressed.

Instead, I looked back to the Helmacron who seemed to be in charge. I swallowed once, then again to clear my voice. "What do—" I coughed and tried again. "What do you want?" My voice went up on octave on the last word, and I stepped on my own foot, telling myself to calm down and think. I could still morph, right? I didn't know, and I didn't want to check in front of these guys, just in case it was an escape I could use later.

The Helmacron looked at me like I was an idiot. (We will subjugate this planet and grind all of its groveling and unworthy inhabitants under our feet. They will beg for our mercy and will amuse us as toys and jesters.)

Oh yeah. That part. "Uhh. Why?" Okay, here's a tip. In case of future alien invasion, I am never to be employed as a negotiator. Even I rolled my eyes at that. "I mean…" Quick, change it into a stunning reversal of logic and insult that reduces his ego a hundred sizes and sends the entire fleet packing. Or at least make the human race seem slightly witty. "…. Why?"

Not only am I not allowed to negotiate in the future; I probably shouldn't even be the girl fetching coffee. I'd probably say something like 'Would you like cream?' which would turn out to be a major insult in their society, prompting them to go all Independence Day on us. And I'm pretty sure Bill Pullman is too old to fly a jet now.

Undeterred, actually probably grateful for the chance to ramble and boast, the Helmacron waved its arms. (We are the mighty Helmacrons! Our rule can never be denied. Our destiny is to step on the backs of the inferior mud wallowers, who exist only to serve our Empire as slaves!)

"You're less than an inch tall!" I blurted out without thinking. "Your entire fleet could be stomped by a half asleep fat guy in the National Guard! Heck, I think a cub scout would stand an even chance against you!"

David said quietly. "And yet, here you are."

That deflated me and I sagged a little as the Helmacron nodded eagerly. (Yes, and with the help of the Changing energy and the leadership of our glorious Captain, we will defeat this mighty Cub Scout military!)

I wasn't sure who this glorious Captain was, but he'd have to practically be dead not to realize his Empire was a bunch of idiots. Then again, maybe he was just as much of an idiot. When what the Helmacron had said got through, I blinked in confusion. "Changing…. You mean the morphing energy? What does that have to do with anything?"

David answered for the Helmacron. "That's how they shrank both of us. I give off a lot of energy, almost as much as the cube itself, I guess. Since I can't use it…" He trailed off a little with a look of intense anger before forcing it back. But for that one second, I saw the terrible frustration and fury that coiled tightly inside him. "… anyway, it's just sitting there and they took advantage."

Looking away from him, I frowned at the Helmacron. "You just used dormant morphing energy in… him to power your shrink ray?"

The Helmacron kept nodding eagerly. (Yes, yes. Now you see how futile your struggle is and you wish to throw yourself at our feet and plead for mercy. You will do so now so that you may practice for your true groveling before our great Captain.) It lifted one of its four feet as though expecting me to lay down and plead right there.

I opened my mouth to give the thing the first retort that came to mind, but then stopped. Maybe it didn't have such a bad idea. I smiled slightly, trying to hope that David wouldn't give me away. "Okay, I'll grovel. But you've got to give me room. We get really emotional when we beg for our lives. Can your people back up a little?"

David's eyes narrowed, but he didn't say anything. I wasn't sure if his Chee body's programming stopped him from risking my life or if he was just waiting to see which side he should jump on. The Helmacron didn't even hesitate before waving its arms. (Give the pitiful human-creature room so that it may grovel in the way most suitable for its species.)

This particular pitiful human creature was tempted to pop the Helmacron in its big bulbous eye, but I refrained. Instead, I spaced my legs apart and bowed my head with a low whisper that the creature had to lean forward to hear. "Ohhhh great and powerful uhhh, Wizard of Oz… Oh merciful and overbearing baked potato with too much tin foil… oh sweet and deserving jellyhead, show your mercy to this Yankees All-Star, as Judge Judy would show the wife of a three time dead-beat husband with an abuse rap. Heap the kindness of your ginormous ego, which is like the Charlie Brown balloon in the Macy's parade."

Even as I spoke, keeping my tone reverent enough that the Helmacrons seemed pleased, I slowly raised both hands in supplication, like a child pleading for the glorious touch of a Pope. In answer, the creature hesitated only slightly before gently laying its hand over mind when I paused, obviously wanting me to continue. I smiled and continued even as the wheels appeared to be turning in David's head. "Oh corpulent minded race of Pinky's missing the Brain, please, in all your absurd battiness, kindly shower this unworthy example of humanity with the gaseous excrement of your words."

The rest of the Helmacrons were smiling and gesturing. David's eyes began to widen as he noticed what was going on. As for the Helmacron leader in front of me, it wasn't doing much of anything besides slumping slightly with a dazed out look on its face, that might have been from all the supposed compliments, but was actually because it was in a trance. I had acquired the Helmacron.

David's shout came then. "Wait, you idiots! She's—" I spun and shoved the Helmacron into him as hard as I could. His programming forced him to step back to avoid hurting the guy, and as soon as he did, I took off. Leaping through the gap between the stumbling Helmacron leader and the nearest guard, I hit the floor and ran for my life.

The Helmacrons were a little slow in reacting. I guess they didn't expect any resistance from something as small as they were on board their own ship. But they wouldn't hesitate forever. Already, their blasters were swiveling to face me. I ran straight at the nearest starfighter thing. If I was normal size, I could have crushed it between two fingers. Now it was about the size of a van.

As soon as I reached the fighter, I jumped, using the stairs that seemed to service a pilot that wanted to climb inside as a spring board to flip to the top. A laser shot ricocheted off the side of the fighter, and I let out something that was half cry and half yelp, almost losing my nerve and falling. I managed to catch myself though, even as more shots came. I leapt up and grasped the edge of one of the laser barrels that stretched up and over the body of the fighter like outstretched pincers. Using all the strength in my upper body, which seemed surprisingly easy somehow, probably related to how small I was, I did a sort of under hand pull up. I kicked my legs up over my head, hitting what I hoped and guessed was the maintenance hatch that lay above this fighter. I had to hit it twice before the hatch fell open, then, with multiple lasers careening around the room from the over eager Helmacron nutjobs, I threw my legs up one more time, letting go to throw myself into the maintenance shaft.

For a moment, I laid there, panting and whimpering in the long shaft that looked like an airduct with funny red lights. I whispered to myself. "I can't believe that worked. I can't believe that worked." I had to say it twice, trying to convince myself that it really had, even as a few more laser blasts blasted into the metal below me. Thankfully, it held. I guess whoever built this thing did so with the assumption that there could be random laser barrages at any time. Knowing the Helmacrons, it probably wasn't a hard assumption.

I couldn't lay there for long though, because I didn't know how much help David could or would give them. I forced myself to turn over and start crawling through the duct, reaching a hand up to wipe away a few surprising tears of terror from being shot at. Don't be mistaken. I might sound brave now, but I was terrified. The only reason I managed to make the move that I had and run with all those guns pointed at me was that there was no one else here. No one was going to push me or guide me. I was the only one that could do anything about this, that could warn the others before they were shrunk too. I had no choice. It was do this, with all the pantswetting terror, or let the world down. I wasn't really brave. I just happened to be there.

While I crawled, I focused on the new Helmacron DNA inside me. The changes slowly began. One moment I put my arm forward to pull myself and it was fleshy pink, and the next time I did so, it was blue. My face bulged outward and to a point as it transformed into the strange Helmacron upside down pyramid, while my eyes bulged out of their sockets and seemed to roll up to my forehead. It was all very squishy sounding.

Then two little bumps appeared on my hips, shoving their way out like a pair of shoes on either side working their way out of my skin. I had to stop and gasp as the new legs squirmed and shoved their way out of me. Meanwhile, my mouth expanded and stretched into the bug-type mouth parts as my teeth inverted sideways.

Finally, the morph was complete. The Helmacron sight seemed to be somewhat like a fly's compound vision, with a full view all the way around. It was a little hard to focus on what was directly in front of me with this full circle view, but I got the hang of it. Then of course there was the Helmacron brain, which I flinched and tried to prepare myself for.

Maybe I shouldn't have morphed into a sentient species. But you know what? I tend to have more sympathy and compassion for the hippo that I've already acquired than for the centimeter high dictators that are trying to kill me. I'd worry about the repercussions if I got out of this alive.

As much as I braced myself for any kind of active brain, there turned out to be… nothing. This whole body felt more like a… shell waiting for a brain. I mean one besides my own. It was strange. There was no instinct, no feelings, nothing but… emptiness. It made me almost more queasy than dealing with a fully functional mind would have. If the Helmacrons didn't even have instinct, what were they?

Work out alien biology later. Right now, I had to get out of here and warn the others. At the next access point, I stopped. There were running footsteps under me as the Helmacrons excitedly declared that they had found another source of changing energy. Who was it? Who were they going after now? It didn't matter; I had to warn whoever it was.

Shoving the grate open, I hopped down, stumbling a little on the uncertain four legs as I tried to sort out which foot went where. Once I managed to catch myself, I looked to see several Helmacrons, probably the ones that had just been running past, staring at me. Note to self, life isn't like the movies. When someone runs past, don't immediately assume they're out of sight just because they're 'off camera'.

(Uhhh…. ) I started before pointing up. (The inflated obese mud wallower intruder is not in the vents any more!) Well it wasn't exactly a lie.

The Helmacrons continued to stare, and I slowly looked down. Then I blanched. See, apparently there was something I forgot in the midst of all this. The Helmacron's silver jumpsuits weren't part of their DNA. So, I hope you weren't too put off when I told you the fate of the Earth rested in the hands of six teenagers.

Because right now it rested in the hands of a naked Helmacron.

God help me but the first thing I thought was, 'Oh good, I'm still female.' I'll spare you the mental imagery, because my second thought was, 'Aaarrgggbleeggghppphhhblubglkackickaewwwchralf'.

But hey. At least I wasn't a naked male Helmacron.


	4. Chapter 4

Here's the next chapter, guys! I hope you enjoy where this is going.

Marcus: I'm glad you like the explanation for how the shrinking is working this time around. It was too good of an opportunity to bring David back, even if it might seem too soon. But I do want him to be reoccurring and not just forgotten. And yeah, it is pathetic the way he'd rather get revenge than actually fix the problem, but that seems like David. Also, I agree, a naked Helmacron is incredibly squicky.

Ani-maniac: Thanks! I really like how Melissa is turning out, and I'm glad you think she fits without taking over someone else's place or character too badly.

Toe of Sauron: Wheee, you came back! That's awesome, and I'm glad you like the reference to your namesake. ;) And yeah, that sentence made sense, but then again, I'm weird. Glad you like it, and nice to hear from you again!

Jay: Way back in my version of the Threat, Cassie explained how David became a part of the team originally and how they trapped him as a rat. Also, in the Rachel book of that trilogy, Rachel says that Cassie told her exactly what happened to make David hate them so much.

SBelle: Oh no, I couldn't just 'change David good'. He makes too good of a vaguely sympathetic 'villain' to neuter him like that. I'm sure he sees himself as a hero of sorts, but then, what good bad guy doesn't see themselves as the good guy? Also, good to see you considering 'your character' returns in this chapter. ;)

Niroi: Aweosme, glad you (and everyone it seems) like the emo, whiny teenaged Sauron.

I'm glad you guys liked the last chapter, and I hope you like this one as well. Please enjoy!

Chapter Four

Haha! Our pitiful rivals, stains on the tapestry of our galactic conquest, have lost their prisoner, O Lord High Master! Those fools aboard the Galaxy Blaster have utterly failed in their mission and their incompetence shall be sung as a ballad to the ages for all time! Once again, your loyal crew aboard the proud ship Planet Crusher, the name of which has always caused agonized dread and sobbing fear among the pitiful and pathetic survivors of our glorious devastation across the known universe, has proven ourselves to be the superior Helmacrons. We will find these change-beasts and we will force them to do our bidding! Once again, the Universe will tremble to its core at the utterance of the name Helmacron! Unless they are Galaxy Blaster Helmacrons, in which case all will laugh. Because the Galaxy Blaster are fools! Fools!

--- From the log of the Helmacron ship, Planet Crusher.

The Helmacrons continued to stare. Who was I kidding? Morph or no morph, I couldn't convince anyone that I was a member of a war-obsessed, psychotically overconfident race of boogers with plasma rifles. I barely scratched out being in the fifth grade play. I was supposed to be a tree of sadness, but I couldn't keep my arms up and I kept smiling goofily at my parents. I was a happy tree! With lazy limbs!

I summoned all of my theatrical skill, which in my case consisted of spreading my arms wide and acting arboreal. At least I got a speaking line this time. (It has also managed to uh… ingest my uniform! I will need another before we lay waste to this planet in the name of the Captain! Point me to the laundry facilities!)

The lead Helmacron sneered, and for a second I thought it was over. Then it pointed. (Have the male get your new uniform and meet us at the docking bay. It is time to abduct another of our prizes. Even the weakling males should be able to recapture the intruding wallower.)

Weak male? That made me blink. The full circle vision didn't show anything behind me, but I looked down to see one of the Helmacrons hovering there. Only he wasn't so much hovering as bowing and he looked different than the Helmacrons I had seen thus far, smaller and weaker somehow. And much less full of himself.

Then it hit me, all of the other Helmacrons I had seen were female. The males were docile, they were the servants. The females were the warriors, the psychos, the crazies. If I saw an _Abercrombie_ & Fitch in here, I was going to write this off as one of Rachel's fever dreams.

The male made a 'come, come' gesture and began to walk with his eyes downcast. I glanced back to the females while starting to walk after him, but they had already forgotten me. (Uhh, what's your name?)

At his blank look, I raised a hand in a gesture. )You know, what are you called?)

His answer sounded as confused as it made me. (Male.)

I shook my head. (Your name is male or you are a male?)

He opened the door we had arrived at. (What is a name?)

Shut up, Melissa! You don't know anything about this race! Apparently they don't have names. (Something for females to have and you not to know about.) I answered primly before stepping inside.

Within the room, I saw row upon row of identical silver jumpsuits with turquoise collars. There was also a row of the laser weapons. I quickly grabbed a jumpsuit and stepped into it, zipping the thing up before taking one of the guns. I didn't have a clue of how to use it, but it might help. Besides, the male would have thought it even more strange if I didn't take it.

(Okay, uhhh, male, take me to the docking bay now.) I ordered in my best 'don't mess with me' voice, which sounded suspiciously like a cross between my 'I just swallowed too many sweettarts' and my 'I really need to sneeze' voices.

Regardless of how pathetic of a demanding female warrior I made, the male led me to the hanger. Just inside, I could see the group of Helmacrons giving each other a pep talk. I could also see David, standing slightly apart from the others with a guard on either side of him. I had to get out of here before they used David's power to shrink the others.

If I kept going, I'd just be back where I started. The second I said anything that made me look unhelmacronish, David would know what was happening. I didn't know why he wasn't actively searching for me, but I didn't want to push things. Instead of continuing to walk, I stopped short and pointed to the fighter furthest away from the group. (Prepare this ship, pl-uhh… male.)

He gave me that same downcast yet confused look and shuffled over to the ship, slowly pushing the wheeled stairs in front of it. I guess that was the extent of the preparation that males were allowed to do. Fanwhoopietastic. But I couldn't back out now, so, praying that the helmacron ships were intuitive, I slowly climbed the stairs.

Just in case by some million to one chance you ever find yourself in a similar situation, here's a tip, the helmacron ships are anything but intuitive. A moment later, I sat in the ship facing a row of instruments that might as well have been in hieroglyphics. Why did such a stupid race have to be so technologically advanced!?

Even as I sat down and pulled the cockpit closed, I was demorphing. I wanted out of that creepy, crazy body and back into my own. Even changing into bugs wasn't nearly as disturbing as finding a body without any sort of intuition or instinct.

A minute later, I was staring, boggle-eyed at the blinking lights and buttons. There was a row of yellow glowing buttons on the right side, a row of blue buttons on the left, a couple big levers above me, and a panel of green lights that might be buttons slightly under these two softball sized crystal orbs that rested where a steering wheel or control stick ought to be. My finger hesitated in midair while I tried to find what might pass as an ignition.

Finally, I settled on using eenie meenie miney moe. Running my fingers along the buttons as I chanted quietly to myself, I eventually settled on a blue button near the right orb. Covering my eyes with one hand, I pressed it gingerly.

Tip number two, when in a similar situation; never trust the fate of the world to eenie meenie. Frankly, Moe's the only trustworthy one. Instantly as I pressed the button, a line of solid red light shot out of the ship and disintegrated one of the other fighters that was parked in front of it.

The Helmacrons at the far end of the docking bay and David were going to have whiplash for days from how fast they spun around at that. David's mouth formed the words and I heard my name. Then the Helmacrons were coming at me. Uh oh.

When in doubt, press every button on the console. I fired three more lasers and disintegrated another ship before screaming. "How many weapons do you have on this thing?!"

In desperation mixed with frustration as the Helmacrons drew near, I shoved both hands against the orbs. Immediately, the ship lifted up, banging off the roof of the hangar as it shot forward. Oh. That was why I couldn't find the ignition button. There wasn't one.

The Helmacrons had come to a stop before the ship could run over them. It was good to see that even their particular brand of suicidal cockiness had its limits. David however, came right under the ship. I think the only thing stopping him from grabbing the fighter was his programming's uncertainty of whether I would survive a forced crash or not. That and he probably wasn't certain that he could stop it even with his strength.

The cockpit of the fighter skimmed inches under the ceiling while the Helmacrons shouted angry demands through my head that I stop and land so that I could be appropriately punished. Instead, I gingerly brushed a hand over the right orb. The ship rocketed upwards, smacking against the ceiling with a bone jarring crash that made me wince. Luckily, nothing seemed broken. I braced myself once more and brushed it slightly in the other direction. The ship lowered almost to the floor and I quickly brushed it back up to avoid picking up hitchhikers.

Abruptly, the Helmacrons seemed to realize that they had ships too and started to run to them. Okay, time to learn faster! I was not going to survive a dogfight in this thing. Escape was my only chance. Taking a chance, I brushed my hand over the left orb. Obediently, the ship shot forward. My dad's old computer used to have this trackball thing instead of a mouse. It was like piloting with two of those! Great, I hated using that thing to check my e-mail and now my life depended on my using two of them in synch?

I couldn't give the Helmacrons time to get to their own ships and take me down though, so there was no time to flinch. Keeping my right hand over that orb, I shoved my left over the other orb and the ship rocketed through the hanger bay. I got all kinds of pleased with myself until I realized the exit was the other direction. I said another bad word when I realized I had to figure out how to turn around. Then I decided that working out turning in this thing wasn't going to be time effective. So, taking a breath, I ran my hand backwards along the orb.

Of all the grand escapes in galactic history, shooting in reverse past a bunch of blue, pimple sized dictators while screaming, "You can't conquer the galaxy! You don't even know what a steering wheel is!" may not be the most impressive, but you have to admit that it's memorable. The left wing clipped the side wall and almost sent the entire thing out of control as I added. "Or rear view mirrors!"

I heard David's voice in my head then. (Melissa. Come back. I can protect you from them. They can't hurt me or my force field. You're not like the others. You didn't betray me. It's not your fault. You can be on my side.) The crazy guy actually sounded hopeful, like he was genuinely reaching out. (You're not one of them.)

Since the fighter was still faced inward toward the docking bay even as it shot out into open sky, I could see him standing there, watching me. I knew he heard me when I spoke, even with the distance between us. "Yes, I am." Then I threw both hands out to spin the orbs, and the ship seemed to sprout rocket boosters, shoving me back into the seat as it careened up and forward, over the Helmacron battleship and out of there!

***********************************************************

"Let me get this straight. There are teeny tiny alien invaders the size of fleas, who shrunk Melissa down to their size, and now they have David?" The question came from Marco, the cute, dark haired boy who is just as much a pessimist as he is a comedian, which is an odd combination. "First it was the Yeerks, then we find out some Intergalactic junk traders were here years ago to kidnap Tobias's mom, and now these guys? Who's next, the Shi'ar? Maybe the Cylons? Is Earth that Burger King just off the freeway that every alien empire has to make a pit stop at? I mean seriously. Who's next?"

(Probably the Vogons.) I muttered while laying on my haunches in the palm of Rachel's hand in the form of the neighbor's Doberman. I liked being in the form of the dog, because dog's don't really worry about anything. They're usually just happy to be alive, and if they get to play, they're even happier. This dog wanted to play, and to sniff this enormous expanse of human skin, but I just laid there after explaining for the third time everything that had happened.

After escaping the Helmacron ship, I had found myself over the school. A few minutes of playing with the control orbs taught me how to move the ship from side to side by spinning the right orb left and right, and to turn one way or the other by moving the left orb the same. The Helmacrons didn't send ships after me. I wasn't sure why. I did know it couldn't be anything good.

It had been easy to find Rachel's house. I knew the route by heart, and it was a good thing I had stolen the fighter, because trying to get there at my current size would have made the trek across the backyard in Honey I Shrunk The Kids look like a quick trot. It hadn't been quite as easy to get Rachel's attention until I smacked myself with a duh and morphed so that she could hear me.

Once I managed to convince Rachel of what was going on, which wasn't that hard once I got her to see me, she contacted Jake. He in turn had to come over and hear it, and then he called the others. Everyone met by Ax's little dug out hole thing that he lives in out in the woods. That was where I had just told the story for the third time. Now I just watched as they all towered over me.

(This is fascinating.) Ax said slowly in wonder, as his stalk eye peered closely at me. (These Helmacrons have used the morphing energy for something that it is clearly not designed for. I wonder if the aspects of this ability may be used to--)

"That's great, Ax." Marco cut into the Andalite's musings. "I hate to interrupt you, but I think Melissa's getting antsy. Get it? Ant--" He doubled over, coughing as Rachel elbowed him with her free arm. "Ow." The motion of her body moving so quickly would have made me fall over if I had been standing. As it was, I felt a little seasick.

Jake frowned and tried to keep everyone on track. "Okay, so we have these miniscule aliens. Helmacrons. Do you know what they are, Ax?"

There was a visible wince from his direction. (No, Prince Jake. I have never heard of this species. Then again, there are literally hundreds of sentient creatures in this universe, and I only have a passing interest in xenoanthropology. But I am quite certain that these beings were never exclusively covered in any of my courses, and reasonably sure that they went entirely unmentioned. The days that I missed or was-- ) He paused before continuing. ( -- otherwise distracted, I made up for later. Mostly.)

Tobias, the boy who had been trapped as a hawk, looked sideways to him from his tree branch. "Ax-man, you could just say 'Nope'."

(Guys?) I pleaded with a bit of desperation. (Can we focus on finding a way to get me back to normal? As normal as I can be, I mean.)

Jake's massive, house sized head nodded. "First, we have to find these Helmacrons. How do we do that?"

There was a sudden rush of movement, accompanied by wind that nearly knocked me out of Rachel's hand, if she hadn't stumbled forward to catch me. Abruptly, two figures stood in front of the group, towering just as tall over me as the others did. Rachel hissed and I could feel her heart beating rapidly as she held me closer to her. I guess she felt a little guilty and maybe upset about nearly dropping me. "What the—Belle? Erek? Don't do that!"

Erek and Belle were both members of the same android race, the Chee, that David had trapped himself as. All I really knew about them was that they were programmed to be pacifists and that despite that, they were incredibly powerful. I also knew that their creators, the Pemalites, had been destroyed thousands of years ago. Now the only remnants of the Pemalites were in the descendants of the beings that the Chee had created by merging the Pemalite spirit with earth wolves. That's right, dogs are the product of wolves mated to super advanced aliens. Think about that the next time Oscar or Fluffy piddles on the couch.

Erek spoke first. "We can locate the Helmacrons. You know that David is with them then." His eyes focused on me in Rachel's hand and he smiled a little. "Nice choice of morph to communicate in, Melissa." He answered my question before I could ask. "I'm sorry, we don't have the technology to put you back to normal."

Belle added. "But we are certain that the Helmacrons themselves can do it. If you catch them. If you stop them." She looked pensive. They both appeared to be on edge. Considering what we were seeing was a holographic image that they had to consciously change, that said a lot for how uptight they had to be.

"Ooookay." Marco frowned, looking straight at Erek. "Go home. I'm serious. You guys are about to say something that makes this more than what it looked like. You're nervous about something, and I hate it when you're nervous. The last time you were nervous, we ended up caught between the yeerks, David, and the leaders of the free world. Just go home. Please."

"Sorry, Marco." Erek did look regretful, and more than that, worried. "This is important. This is so important."

Jake sighed, closing his eyes and looking for a moment like he really wanted to agree with his best friend and tell them to go home. "What is it? And can you really track the Helmacrons?"

"Yes." Belle nodded. "That's why we both came. There are two Helmacron ships. We must track them both and force them to leave this place, before it is too late."

(What's the rush?) Tobias asked from his tree. (I mean, not that we shouldn't hurry and help Melissa, but why are you rocketing in here and andele'ing us on? What's the deal?)

The two Chee looked to one another before nodding. Belle started. "The Helmacrons may not be a serious threat themselves, but there is a reason they are so confident. They have never met a planet that was not swiftly conquered."

"Huh?" Rachel's hand tightened a little and I winced. "What are you talking about? They're tiny. How do they conquer entire worlds?"

Belle shook her head. "You misunderstand. I did not mean that they conquer the world. They are harbringers, heralds. They find the worlds for conquering. Later, the worlds are destroyed and the Helmacrons remain convinced that it was their doing. But they are simply searchers. It is what comes after the Helmacrons, following their lead, which you must fear."

No one else spoke for a minute, so I found my voice and asked, tentatively. (What… what comes after the Helmacrons?)

Erek's gaze focused on me once more, and his voice was pained, cracking. "After the Helmacrons… come the Howlers."


	5. Chapter 5

Hey, you guys. Sorry for the two month long (and then some) silence. Contrary to what you might have thought, I'm not dead. I've just been busy with work. But I managed to get my head clear and I've got the next chapter here for you. As always, I hope you guys enjoy reading it as much as I did writing it. Have fun!

Chapter Five

(So, these Howler things, I get that they're bad. But how bad?) I was asking this even as Rachel and Jake followed Erek while I continued hitching a ride in Rachel's hand. The others were going with Belle after the other ship. It had taken all of a minute to split up and get moving after the Chee's announcement, and fifty seven seconds of that had been everyone else staring at them in shock.

To make things quicker, Erek had taken us to a car and was now driving in the direction that he said the Helmacron ship was. It actually helped a lot, since we could travel faster without Jake and Rachel exhausting themselves flying. Plus it saved us morphing time. I had demorphed and remorphed the dog so I could keep talking to them, and was lying against a finger that was as big as a couch. Sure, I could have morphed something else, like the Helmacron so that I'd have hands, but something about that body being completely absent of any instinct or emotion was too utterly strange, and I didn't want to use it any more than I had to. Besides, the Animorphs still have this sort of rule about morphing sentient species, and I probably shouldn't rub the fact that I violated it in Jake's face. He might revoke my membership or something.

Erek answered tersely. "They are the creatures responsible for the annihilation of our creators. They will lay waste to this planet and everything on it. None of your weapons will harm them. They will make a mockery of your defenses. They will destroy all that they find and those who hide will be killed by the multitude of viruses they unleash upon the world. Those lucky enough to survive the viruses and attacks will either starve as the land around them is reduced to a barren wasteland or burn as the air itself is ignited. Within three days, the Howlers will leave this planet as lifeless as your moon."

"Oh." That was all I could think of to say. I know you're supposed to have a courageous or at least flippant remark to something like that. But all I could think of was that I was scared. It's hard to be brave when you're less than an inch tall. I don't know how the Helmacrons managed it so well. What I really wanted to do was talk to my dad, my real dad. I wanted to talk to him, and to my mom. I wanted to ask their advice. I wanted them to deal with this stuff. This was too dangerous. It was too real. I had barely escaped the Helmacron ship, and that was after the one time I tried to do something on my own without the others had blown up in my face and nearly ended up getting me killed or captured. Scratch that, had ended up getting me captured. The fact that I'd escaped without giving away the secret was due completely to the Helmacron arrogance in not immediately turning me over to my father. If they had, I couldn't think about what would be happening right now.

But, as scared as I was, there was no one else to call. No one else could deal with this. We had to get the Helmacrons to leave earth before they attracted the Howlers here. We just had to find them first.

"That's not going to happen." Jake said with more certainty than I could have managed. "We get rid of the Helmacrons and the Howlers never show up, right?"

"Man, I knew those idiots were bad news." Rachel lifted her hand to peer at me. "I say we pinch their little heads until they fix Melissa and then bottle rocket them into orbit." She punched a fist into her other hand for emphasis.

"As much as I hate to agree with Rachel's certain tendencies," Erek spoke quietly, which of course was still a dull thunder to me. "She's right. The Helmacrons must be ejected from this planet as quickly as possible." The slightest smirk crossed his all too dour expression. "Not that pinching their heads would do you any good."

I heard the frown in Rachel's voice. "What do you mean? They're not invulnerable or anything, are they?" She sounded annoyed, like the Helmacrons had some nerve if they wouldn't let her squish their tiny heads.

Erek answered after a momentary pause. "No, you can destroy their body. But the Helmacron mind within the body will simply jump to the next available Helmacron body."

That got me onto all four feet. (Wait, when I morphed one of them, it didn't have any instincts. There was… nothing. The mind was just completely blank, like it wasn't there at all.)

Turning his small-mountain sized head toward me, Erek nodded. "That makes sense. The bodies are simply storage vessels to contain their minds. If there was no mind ready for the body, it would be empty."

I would say my mouth fell open, but it was already open as my tongue lolled out and panted. I sat once more on my haunches and muttered. (Aliens are friggin weird, dude.)

"A truer statement has never been uttered." I saw the smile stretch across Erek's face as he added. "And let me remind you, that humans are alien to me."

"Hey, what's so weird about humans?" Jake demanded about a second before Rachel could.

Erek reached across the seats and lightly slapped Jake on the back. "Jake my friend," He turned with a toothy grin. "Humans, as much as I love you guys, are incredibly screwed up." He raised his finger while the car slowed, then his armed moved and I guess he was pointing because he said. "The Helmacron ship is in that building, in the basement."

I heard the car door open and Jake's enormous body moved out of my sight. A moment later Rachel stood up out of the car and I had to huddle down tightly in her palm as the breeze picked up. It was practically black out here, under a broken street light, which meant I couldn't see anything at all. I sighed and peered through the darkness. It didn't help. Dog vision isn't that fantastic to begin with, and in the dark it was almost as useless as human vision. Normally I'd have been able to smell everything within a three block radius, but I was so tiny that all I could smell was Rachel's hand.

"I can't be a party to what you might have to do in there." Erek spoke with obvious reluctance. "I should wait here." He sounded upset that he wasn't going to be able to help us stop the Helmacrons. "When you get their ship, be careful. You have to disable it before they can shrink you."

Jake mimed writing on his hand. "Don't get shrunk. Got it. Anything else?" After a second, he added with a slightly surprised tone. "Hey, this being sarcastic to a guy giving you perfectly reasonable instructions thing is pretty cool. I see why Marco likes it so much. But don't you dare tell him I said that."

"Be careful." Erek's serious tone was back. "I mean it, the Helmacrons may be push overs at their size, but you have to take them seriously. If you don't, you'll end up…" His voice trailed off.

I sighed inwardly. (Like me. You'll end up like me. He's right, Jake, be careful.)

Rachel asked. "Aren't you going to tell me to be careful?"

(Would it do any good?) I teased her lightly. We both knew she'd be as careful as she could be, carrying me with her. I couldn't stay with Erek, not if I was going to help them spot the Helmacron ship. Besides, I wanted to be as close to that thing as possible so they could unshrink me.

A minute later, we crept up to the building. Well, Jake and Rachel crept. I lounged. "This is gonna suck." Rachel whispered. "As soon as I have to morph, we're going to lose you."

(Nah, I'll just climb on your head or something. If you go grizzly or elephant, I'll never fall off.)

Jake replied in a voice that was quiet enough to be only a mild earthquake to me. "What if she morphs something other than a battle morph?" He answered his own question a second later. "Oh, right, it's Rachel. Never mind." The hand I was in shook a little as Rachel moved and I heard Jake grunt as her other elbow hit his ribs.

(So where are we? I can't really see.) I shoved my nose near the edge of Rachel's hand and took a sniff. Nope, nothing but potato chips and conditioner. Apparently Rachel had been snacking in bed again.

"It looks like an old hotel." Jake answered. "I think it's shut down now. But I don't know what the Helmacrons would be looking for here."

"Let's find out." Rachel was on her feet and moving immediately, careful to keep her hand cupped so I wasn't jostled out. With Jake following and muttering about why the heck anyone would want to have a plan or anything silly like that, we moved to the nearest window. "It's broken." Rachel whispered, and then I felt her reach through to unlatch the window, then start to climb through it while Jake sputtered and hissed for her to stop.

Once Rachel had clambered into the room, she whispered back through the window. "Are you coming or not? How else do you expect to find these idiots?"

Jake sighed and mumbled something about not needing to be idiots to find other ones, but he climbed in. This room was lit enough that I could see. (It's a… bedroom. Oh, motel room.)

Rachel's head bobbed far above me in a nod. "Yeah, a really dirty motel room. God, this place is disgusting."

The annoyance was palpable in Jake's voice as he hissed. "I'll be sure to complain to the maid when we check out."

"You're just grumpy because I found the broken window first." Rachel replied almost primly before moving to the door. She quieted once we reached it, and very slowly turned the knob.

Jake stood behind her, and both of them craned their necks as the door opened to reveal a long, empty hallway that was apparently just as dirty as the room. After a minute of silence, they crept into the hall. This was extremely dangerous, for either of them to be seen in a place they shouldn't be in their human forms. But since we didn't know what to expect, they couldn't morph anything or they might end up in the wrong shape. Not that human was the right shape by any means, but at least they could morph directly to what they might need instead of having to demorph first.

I was jostled along as we moved down the hall. The dog in me was just happy to go along for a ride. I kept having this weird urge to stick my head out of Rachel's cupped hand and flop my tongue in the breeze. Thankfully, I managed to suppress it. So I just looked tiny and useless instead of ridiculous. I had to save what face I could. Everyone else in our little group was an alien butt kicker. In my first solo outing, I had managed to get myself turned into a G.I. Joe action figure's baby sister. The three inch version.

We continued down the hall until they both abruptly stopped at the sound of voices. "Is that coming from…" I had to strain to see what directly Jake's head was pointed, but when I looked that way, I could make out a railing and stairs that led down.

Rachel agreed and a moment later we were drawing closer to the loud voices and shortly, the sound of dracon beam fire. At that, we stopped again.

"Yeerks." Jake's voice was a low hiss as he leaned close to Rachel. "This must be a yeerk pool entrance. Why are they going here? Oh god, if they're trying to report in…"

Rachel disagreed. "If they were trying to report, we wouldn't be hearing them fighting. Come on, let's get in there." She reached up and pushed her hand near her head. "Jump on, and try not to fall off. Go human so you can have hands to hold on with."

It was a good idea, so I started to demorph. I didn't really want to, since another benefit of being in the shape of the happy go lucky goof that is the dog is that it tempers my own panic and fear, making it easier to accept my situation. It was sort of like anesthetic for my brain. As soon as I was demorphed, the slowly crushing terror that I would be stuck in this size forever began to weigh on me once more. I struggled to push it aside while getting a firm grip on one of Rachel's hairs near her scalp. To me, the hair was a solid rope. I just hoped I wouldn't end up ripping it out. Just to be safe, I pulled a few more near and wrapped myself around them.

Then everything started to shake and tear itself apart. I almost screamed before realizing it was just Rachel morphing. I couldn't tell what she was becoming exactly, but since all her long hair was becoming shorter and shaggy, I was betting on grizzly.

Jake spoke next, apparently already having changed while Rachel waited to give me a chance. (I hope you're hanging on tight, Melissa. This is about to get wild. Let's hope there's just a couple of them.)

At that point, Rachel must have finished morphing. Because, suddenly we were charging, taking just enough time for my batshit insane friend to roar. The ground that was the back of the grizzly's head shook and tried to throw me off, but I clung as tightly as I could to the fur that I still had a hold of.

Jake was somewhere close behind us, remarking as he ran. (Were we charging? Because funny, I distinctly don't remember saying 'charge'.)

(Oh lighten up.) Rachel replied with obvious exhilaration as she ripped her way down the hall, trashing everything in her path from the sound of things. (We get to mess up a few yeerks and punt some tiny alien butt.)

I'm not entirely clear on what happened next. From my vantage point, all I could see was the occasional flash of something moving past the grizzly's head. I could hear a lot of screaming and roaring though. I hoped that meant we were winning.

(The ship!) I heard Jake call out. (To your left, above you!)

The head completely rolled to peer upward and I had to squeal and hold on as up was suddenly down. I was dangling off the grizzly's head from some unknown height for a second before it quickly turned back as Rachel corrected herself. (Sorry! Sorry, Melissa. Jake, get it!)

(I'm on it! Gaaahh, I'm hit!) I had heard the dracon beam and Jake's subsequent cry of pain made me flinch. Why couldn't I be out there? Why couldn't I be helping?

(Jake!) Rachel cried out and I heard the bear roar as we ran over some poor Controller. (That's all of them! We can get the ship now. Jake, demorph! That's all of them, demorph!)

I don't know if Jake listened, because at that moment, there was a flash of green light that I recognized. My eyes widened and I yelled. "Rachel! Rachel, the shrink ray! You've got to get out of here! Rachel!" I yelled as loud as I could, as near to her ear as I could get, but it was too late. Almost immediately, I felt the ground under me start to shrink. "Oh frak."

It was no use. We were going down. I heard Rachel's confused. (What the hell?)

I had to roll off of her because she was suddenly only three times my size. "Rachel! You got hit by their shrink ray!" I winced and gestured helplessly as she continued shrinking until she was exactly my size. Then I blinked. "Hey, you're my size. I mean, you're exactly my size. Shouldn't the bear be bigger?"

(It must not be relative. Their ray must put everything to the same size, their size.) Rachel remarked while she demorphed. Then she lifted her head up, and up to the nearest mountain range that was a fallen body. "Oh this bites. God, this sucks. I'm going to kill those little pieces of dog regurgitated shit."

I gulped as the ship hovered over us. "You might get your chance sooner than you think." Sure enough, we both began to float up toward the waiting aliens. "They're pulling us in! I just went through this!"

"This is good." Rachel insisted. "They take us in, we kick all their butts and make them turn us back."

That made me squint at her. "You did hear the part where they were all armed with laser guns and everything, right?" When she shrugged, I sighed.

It didn't matter though, because before we could be pulled all the way into the ship, a completely different tractor beam caught hold of us. It yanked us another direction as we both yelped. The second Helmacron ship was slightly to the right of the first one. "Hey, what's going on?" I wondered aloud.

Above us, the two ships continued juking around each other while flying up and out of the building. First one ship would have us in its tractor, then the other. It was the worst, or the best, amusement park ride ever. Our sense of balance was completely screwed as we were lunged first one way, then another. I don't know how we both refrained from hurling.

"These idiots are fighting over who gets the booty." Rachel remarked with derision. "What kind of stupid, messed up morons—"

"The kind that have us captured, regardless of which ship gets us in the end." I interrupted. "Unless we do something."

Rachel nodded, then gulped and turned green as we were violently twisted toward one of the ships briefly. "Next time we get yanked, throw yourself in that direction."

I nodded, and as soon as I felt the next jolt, I shoved myself that way as hard as I could. Miraculously, it worked. We were both thrown through the tractor beam. Unfortunately, it worked. We were both thrown through the tractor beam. It meant we were suddenly falling. Suddenly, this didn't seem like such a bright idea.

Now the ships were actually firing a few shots at each other as they fought to be the one to recapture us. But before we could fall very far, one of them had the bright idea of flying under us. We both had time to look down and wince before hitting the top of the ship and bouncing a little with muffled groans. But hey, at least we weren't dead.

I amended that to 'yet' when I lifted my head to see a group of Helmacrons standing on top of the ship. When we saw them, Rachel remarked. "They look about as stupid as I figured."

David stood a little off to the side. When Rachel's eyes slid to him, she scrambled to her feet with a furious scowl. "You little troll!"

"Funny you should mention little, Thumbelina." David retorted with obvious pleasure. "Nice of you to join the party. Like I told my new friends here, they couldn't have near as much fun with Melissa as they could with a psycho like you."

The Helmacrons were saying something about being their pathetic little lapdog prisoners all hail the mighty Helmacron grand poobah, yadda yadda. My attention was on Rachel, whose lip was curled in contempt as she stared at David. Then, her gaze moved past him, beyond the edge of the ship. She looked at me and asked. "Are you thinking what I am?"

I glanced to David, who seemed to be trying to work out what she was getting at. "Almost never. But this time, I've got it." She opened her mouth, but I spoke up first. "Let's do it." To her look, I shrugged. "I just wanted to say it this time."

Rachel grinned and turned back to David. "Hey, traitor. Can Chee piss themselves?"

David slowly frowned at that while the Helmacrons drew closer and began to shout more demands. "Why?"

Simultaneously, we both started to run at him. David had time to take a reflexive step back, a mistake on his part, while opening his mouth with a question. I felt and heard two of the Helmacron lasers pass behind us, and then we crashed into the android boy. Rachel hit one arm and I hit the other.

Then we were falling. Rachel, me, and David were all windmilling through the air, god only knew how far above the ground. Even as we plummeted, screaming, Rachel had the nerve to yell back at David. "That's why!"


	6. Chapter 6

Hey, you guys. I'd like to apologize for leaving you hanging for so damn long. It wasn't fair. All I can say is that I'm sorry. I was working on my own writing, for something I'd like to eventually get published for real, something that I obviously can't do with this. But, since I'm around halfway done with that, I thought I should update this. I hope you forgive me, and that someone is still reading. Enjoy it if you like, and please let me know. I'll keep writing as long as I have people who want to read it. Peace!

Chapter Six

Praise be to the Glorious Overlord of our Esteemed and Magnificent Fleet of World Conquering Behemoths! Your awe-inspiring leadership surely has paved the way to our obvious and inevitable victory. Our Incredible Ascendancy awaits only our locating of the pathetic, contemptible change-capable planet dwellers. Once they are found, they will all marvel and cower in terror under our might. This would of course happen much sooner if your awe-inspiring leadership could see fit to provide a map to their location...

--- From the log of the Helmacron ship, Galaxy Blaster.

Here's the thing. When you're surrounded by heavily armed aliens that want to kill you, jumping off the nearest ledge seems like a perfectly valid plan. Three seconds later, when you're falling through what to you is several miles of open air toward the ground below, it becomes clear that it's lacking something. I'd say sanity, but the last time I had that was before I could morph. Wait. I threw my train of thought into reverse and backed up several words. Morph.

"Morph!" I called out to Rachel before noticing that she was halfway into her bald eagle form. She couldn't speak that way, so I said the "Duh." for her and then began my own change. As quickly as I could, I began to change into my own bird-of-prey morph, the merlin. Sure the bird was small, but back when I chose it, I had hoped that the name would give me some kind of karmic connection to one of the most powerful wizards in mythology. You laugh now, but at the time I had just been told that alien invaders were hijacking people's brains. How should I know what could work?

I'm pretty sure adrenaline must fuel morphing, because sometimes it seems to take full minute or two to finish a morph, while other times it takes less than half that. It seems to be dependant on just how desperate you are. So like I said, adrenaline.

Whatever the reason for morphing being faster in near-death situations, I was glad for it. Because it meant that I actually managed to get my wings and flare them in time to avoid splatting against the ground. It's possible that I would have just bounced, giving my size. But that was a theory I didn't particularly want to test. If you are ever shrunk to less than an inch tall and subsequently find yourself falling practically from orbit, feel free to let me know if it works.

Rachel let out a whoop that let me know she was alive, just as both of us practically crashed into each other. Of course, our current size situation notwithstanding, Rachel hitting me would have been the equivilant of a 747 plowing through, well, a bird. I told you I need to work on my analogies.

We both managed to veer off and I looked down in time to see David plow into the dirt. I knew he wasn't hurt because, well Chee are practically invulnerable. But I still winced a little. (Do you think he's out of it?)

Rachel replied with obvious scorn. (If you think we're that lucky, you really are new.) She angled her wings and began to drop. (Come on, we better find him.)

I cast a glance up through the sky, looking for the Helmacron ship. I couldn't see it, but I knew it had to be somewhere. Though as fast as everything had been going, they might have gotten miles away from us before anyone thought to throw the brakes. Finding nothing in the sky, I followed Rachel toward the ground. (What do we do with him? Ask for him to please guide us to the nearest Chee stronghold? Do Chee have strongholds? Or is that too violent of a term. Peaceholds, maybe? Happyholds?)

(I'm not sure. But the only place he'll lead us is straight into a trap, if we let him.) Rachel replied slowly while banking in for a landing on a twig the size of a car. There was a hole in front of the twig where David had drilled into the ground when he hit. All around us were blades of grass the size of palm trees. I landed beside her and both of us began to demorph.

I hadn't had time to really notice when we were on the ship, but because Rachel had been shrunk in her bear form while I had been human at the time, and both of us were shrunk to the same baseline, when she was human now, Rachel was about a head shorter than I was. That was kind of weird, since she's usually a head taller. "Huh." I commented. "I don't think I've seen the top of your head from this angle before."

We saw David pulling himself out of the hole then. Upon seeing two barefoot, leotard wearing girls watching him with folded arms, he raised his gaze skyward and muttered something before turning his sneer on Rachel. "I see your stupidity didn't shrink with the rest of you."

"I see your ego stayed the same too." Rachel shot back. Then she got angry, pushing up into David's personal space as her hands grabbed at his shirt, or the solid hologram projected into the form of his shirt. "Why are you working with these little idiots? You just can't wait to sell out the human race to the nearest bidder, huh?"

"Why am I working with them?" David replied mockingly. "Let's see, maybe because they're not the ones who have now made a habit out of trapping me in a form that I can't do anything in?"

"Oh gee." Rachel rolled her eyes. "I am so sorry that we trapped you in a form that stopped you from killing everyone and dooming the planet. I'll write out an apology letter right now."

"Not we." David's voice was low, cold as he raised a finger to point it at her. "You. You trapped me this way. You humiliated me. You made me helpless. And I..." He focused entirely on Rachel. I'm not even sure he remembered that I was there. "... am going to make sure that you feel the exact same defeat."

I pushed myself between the two of them before they could burn each other to death with their glares. "Rachel! Rachel, we have David. We have to get back to Jake. We have to get help, and make sure he's all right."

She didn't look away from David. "We still have to get that ship."

I snorted. "What are you going to do, lure the ship full of alien invaders down here and stage a hostile take-over?" Realizing belatedly that this was Rachel I was talking to, I corrected my phrasing. "You are not going to lure a ship full of alien invaders down here and stage a hostile take-over." When she didn't respond except to smile, I shouted. "Rachel, they have laser rifles!"

Her reply was calm. "So do the yeerks. We fight them. We can fight these turkeys. Besides," She finally looked away from David to give me her trademark predatory cover girl smile. "We're smarter than they are."

David snorted and looked vaguely amused. "Sure, you're both smarter than the aliens that shrunk you down to their size."

Rachel pushed her hair out of her face while smirking at him. I really think she was at home with all of this. "Considering how well we out smarted you, I don't think you really want to lower the bar for our intelligence, Sparky." That shut the boy up briefly and she looked back to me. "They'll come back looking for us. Hopefully they'll land and search. When they do, we'll jump a couple of them, morph them, then sneak onto and take over their ship."

I stared at this mad woman for about six silent seconds, and then flailed my arms. "Oh, is that all?! I thought you were going to suggest we do something suicidal. At least there's--oh wait that is suicidal!"

David spoke up, sounding casually curious. "And what exactly makes you think I won't whistle and holler dixie when you try this?"

Rachel opened her mouth to respond to me, then shot David a glare. "Because if you do, we're dead. And your programming won't let that happen. Besides, you're so arrogant that you still think you're going to get out of this body one day. And if that happens, you want to beat us yourself." Then she turned to me once more. "Melissa, we can do this. They're cocky, arrogant, and they have no idea what they're up against."

I responded dryly. "So basically, the difference between them and us is that we know what we're up against?"

She grinned and gave me a high five. "Exactly!"

That made me sigh. "That wasn't supposed to encourage you." I thought of something else and gestured. "Where are we going to hide out? They could be here any second."

"Over there." Rachel pointed to a stack pile of bricks that towered off into the sky. In reality it was probably about four feet high. To us, it was the Empire State Building. Small gaps between the bricks were enormous caverns where we could hide and wait. "We'll have to morph birds to get there, but that should draw them back faster anyway, if they track morphing energy."

"Yeah." I replied slowly, unable to believe what we were doing. "Because that's exactly what we want, to get the psychotic alien death machines here faster." At her answering grin, before she could respond I shouted. "Sarcasm! That was sarcasm, Rachel!"

* * *

"This is insane, Melissa. You know she's crazy." David's voice had been droning on the entire time that we had been holed up waiting for the Helmacron arrival. "We should be getting the hell out of here and letting the Chee find a way to fix us, not waiting to ambush this army."

(We?) I retorted sharply. (What's this we? Even if you could help, you wouldn't.) I had taken on the shape of the Helmacron that I'd acquired and was using a piece of a leaf to conserve some small portion of modesty. I wished that I had kept the jumpsuit I borrowed from the ship before. And that laser rifle might have been nice too. At least the Helmacron body didn't have instinct trying to tell me what to do. Then again, the lack of it was almost as distracting as the presence would have been. We were all standing in the shallow recess near the left bottom corner of the brick pile monument.

"Of course not." David's voice was patronizing. "Not before, and not with her. She did this to me. She threatened my family, before, in the other reality. She's the same way in this one. She's insane, Melissa! She's going to get everyone killed, just to fill her own need for--"

(Shut up.) Rachel's voice was remarkably calm. Then again, in her elephant form, she was much harder to hurt. Even at our reduced size, the elephant towered over the Helmacron. (You made your choice, David. Before and now. You could have gone back to your family. You could have warned them. You could have made everything perfect for yourself. But you just had to get your revenge. And now you're stuck. Well, live with it.) She finished bluntly.

Then she quieted, because we all heard it. The whine of the Helmacron ship approaching. We could see spotlights flaring out over the ground around the bricks as they searched for the source of the energy they were tracking. A moment later, a voice bellowed out through our minds, demanding that we surrender.

(Yeah, cuz that's gonna happen.) Rachel commented darkly before shouting up at them. (Come down and find us, you lunatic goggle-eyed pyramid heads!)

(Rachel.) I said tensely. (Maybe giving them the nickname of one of the scariest bad guys in video game history isn't the best way to encourage my participation in this exercise. Just saying.)

Before she could respond, we saw squads of Helmacrons begin to descend on those tractor beam things that they had used to pull us in. There were three separate squads of four Helmacrons each. Rachel practically stamped the ground in glee. (Here they come.)

(Yay?) I watched the alien teams split up and start to search for us. The nearest quad were yapping it up as they came closer. They continued to go on about how pathetic we were and how they'd strip the flesh from our bones as we wailed and pleaded for mercy while our blood boiled out through our eyes. You know, the usual.

(Wait for it...) Rachel whispered, shifting her relatively immense bulk in the darkness. I really hoped she restrained herself from trumpeting. She lowered her head and we all watched as the four helmacrons drew closer, picking their way around boulder sized flecks of dirt. One of them was waving a hand along the length of the rubble tower while excitedly declaring that it would be the ideal location from which to stage the attacks that would cripple our military. You had to say this much about the Helmacrons, they didn't lack for ambition. Sanity, common sense, functioning survival instinct maybe, but not ambition.

Just as the four heavily armed, comma sized sociopaths turned the corner into our shadowy nook, Rachel lunged forward. I tried to stay out of her way, pressed back against David. He actually put his hand on my shoulder with what I could have sworn was a reassuring squeeze. "It's all right."

I didn't have time to wonder what he was up to, because Rachel had just finished stomping two of the Helmacrons flat. I tried to remind myself that their minds would just jump into other bodies. The third she held up tightly in her trunk while the fourth lay prone under one of her large feet while she pressed it gently down. (Hey guys.) She remarked calmly. (We need to borrow your clothes.) The four would-be conquerers had been dispatched without any of them getting off so much as a single shot. I would have said that they weren't exactly the cream of the Helmacron military. But I had the distinct thought that they actually were.

Minutes later, the surviving Helmacrons were unconscious and Rachel had already acquired one of them. We had taken their jumpsuits and their weapons. Now, Rachel turned to David. (Let's go.)

David shook his head. "No." He shrugged. "What are you going to do? You can't hurt me. You can't drag me either. And nothing in my programming forces me to help you here. In fact, my staying out of it reduces the chance of you getting caught. So no, I'll stay right here and you can decide if you'd rather take this ship, or stand here and watch me. Hmmm, I wonder if the shrinkage is permanent eventually."

She glared as well as marble shaped balls on top of an inverted pyramid were capable of glaring, but David remained confidently motionless. "Tick Tock, Rachel." The sneer in his voice didn't even need the hologram's portrayal. "What's more important, leaving me on my own or getting up there and getting back to your normal size?"

I don't know what Rachel would have said, because at that moment, the ground shook violently. All of us were thrown to the ground while the earth rumbled. I hugged the ground and shouted. (What's going on?!)

Rachel got it before I did, calling back. (Cars! A bunch of cars just pulled up!) That was the source of the rumbling ground. Several vehicles had torn up over the grass and parked in a semicircle around the small area we were in, end to end. We were enclosed in a wall of mountain sized metal.

(This...) I started slowly. (Is not good.)

Just how not good it was became perfectly clear only seconds later. A voice filled all of our heads, one that was cold and devoid of any warmth, one that made even Rachel sieze up a little bit. (Our new friends say that the Andalite Bandits are here. Get those lights on, and find them. If any of them escape, all of you will be executed before the Council.)

We were a sixteenth of an inch tall, trapped in a pile of bricks, and Visser Three had arrived. Could things possibly get worse? As if in answer to that, I looked behind me to find that yes, yes they could.

David had disappeared.


	7. Chapter 7

So guess what? Not only am I alive, but I finished my book and I'm currently submitting it to agents. We'll see how that goes. In the meantime, I have a brand new chapter for you! More to come soon now.

Chapter Seven

(He left?) Rachel was tipping over from fuming to boiling. (That little piece of shit punk!)

(Yes.) I responded dryly. (By all means, let's take all the time that's necessary to adjust to the shock of this turn of events.) Without pausing, I went on. (Well, that's done. What do we do about the ummm... insane megalomaniacal alien that wants to kill us?) A moment of thought after that, I winced. (You know, when I have to narrow it down further than that, life just sucks.)

(On the plus side,) Rachel finally dragged her attention away from the spot where David had been. (You're getting better at the whole joking through life threatening situations thing.)

(Yay me?) Unfortunately, the pounding footsteps that rocked the ground we were standing on as human-controllers swept the grass with flashlights reminded me that the bad guys don't like to wait for you to finish your personal discussions before trying to capture, maim, and even kill you. It was rude, but what was I going to do? There are certain things the Better Business Bureau just isn't qualified to regulate. Swallowing, I stepped closer to my friend. (Uhhh, Rachel, I'd love to continue this bantering thing, but can we please please please get out of here before they find us? Please with a cherry on top?)

(Right.) Rachel frowned. (Um. I'm not... exactly sure how we're going to do that.)

She went silent, looking at the grass around us while I watched the sweeping beams of light coming closer with each pass. Reflexively, I pressed myself backwards against the thick wall of the blade of grass behind me as though that might help. Yeah, that was likely. I wanted to see that headline. Dracon beams stopped by grass! Yeerk technology defenseless against Kentucky Blue. Whole Andalite fleet mocked ridiculously for eating their entire defensive structure! Through their hooves somehow! Further investigation on that pending! My newspaper would have a lot of exclamation marks.

(Rachel!) I tried not to sound panicked. (We have to go now! I want my exclamation marks!)

(Okay, we just-) Rachel turned to me. I'm not sure how you make jello marble eyes squint, but she managed it. (What?)

Realizing what I had said, I just shook my head. (Never mind. How do we get out of here?) I pressed further back into the shadows as the beam of light from one of the nearest controller's swept a little too close to my toes. We couldn't go any further back with the bricks blocking the way, and any second now the methodically searching Controllers were going to find us. They were kneeling in the grass, carefully passing their lights over every millimeter of ground, leaving nothing unturned. If we morphed, the Helmacrons would pinpoint the energy immediately.

(Yes, little Andalites.) The Visser's voice was as cheerful as I had ever heard it. (You're starting to realize that your tricks won't be of any help now. How does it feel, to be, as these humans say, trapped like mice?) One of the nearer human-controllers murmered something to him, and I heard the sound of something whipping through the air, followed by a crash that shook the ground as something heavy fell. Visser 3 asked almost casually. (Would anyone else like to correct my Earth terms?) No one did. I know I for one was ready to let him rewrite the entire dictionary of modern phrases if it tickled his fancy.

(Rachel.) I practically whimpered. I'm not too proud to admit that I was scared. It's hard to be brave when a dozen heavily armed people who want to kill you actually aren't the most threatening things within ten feet.

I felt Rachel's hand, or at least the helmacron hand, on my back. (It's okay. When I tell you to, run into the light.)

That made me turn and look at my obviously deranged friend like the mentally ill nutjob she was. (Into the light? Rachel, I have every intention of staying as far away from the light as possible. And I mean that in every conceivable term.)

She stared right back at me. (Trust me, Melissa. There's not time to explain. We run into the light on the count of three.)

I shook the upside down pyramid head as fast as I could. (That's not-)

Rachel tensed and bent slightly on all four Helmacron legs, preparing herself. (One.) The light from the nearest Controller began to sweep back along the path ahead of us.

(But we don't even have-) I continued to protest, waving the spindly arms.

(Two.) Rachel put her hands on my back, squeezing firmly.

(I don't wanna-)

(Three!) Giving me a solid push to start me running, I felt Rachel coming up fast right beside me.

(-die!) Despite my panicked protests, I didn't fight the push and started running. I didn't know why we were doing this, but at least I trusted her. She may have been crazy and prone to taking risks, but she wasn't stupid. There's suicide crazy and there's warrior crazy. Maybe moreso than any of the others except Ax, Rachel is a warrior. If she was running into the light, it was because she had a plan. It was probably at least half delusional and required what I like to call Rachel-logic to understand, but it was more than I had.

Together, both of us sprinted between the huge blades of grass and into the light. Almost immediately, the controller moving the flashlight shouted in excitement. Rachel grabbed my arm and jerked me to a stop, even as several more lights converged directly on us. I saw the enormous hand of the Controller nearest us start to reach out. I saw the Visser's tail pull back. Resisting the urge to whimper as we both stood flatfooted in plain sight, I prayed that Rachel hadn't been replaced by some kind of body snatcher, which would be really redundant at this point anyway, and that she really did have a plan.

As it turned out, what Rachel had wasn't so much a plan as it was a boyfriend. Even as those giant human fingers reached for us, a piercing hawk shriek filled the air as a small brown feathered missile shot out of the sky. I heard the Visser's enraged scream of warning and then a hard talon closed around both me and Rachel, hauling us off the grass. Tobias skimmed the grass, flapping as hard as he could while shouting in triumph. (Evening, ladies. I know you both love the spotlight, but let's see if we can't find you a less hostile audience.)

A few shots were fired after us, but as it turns out, it's kind of difficult to hit a moving target the size of a hawk at night. I heard Visser 3 scream again, and shuddered inwardly. I actually felt sorry for the men who had failed to contain us. Then I turned my bulbous eyes toward Rachel while the two of us were held tightly within a single set of talons. We hadn't been so much picked up by the talons as swept away by them like a couple of bugs hitting a windshield. Thankfully without the splatter part. (Would it have been that hard to say 'Tobias is going to pick us up and needs to be able to see us?')

Rachel had already started to demorph back to her human form. She started to say something but was cut off as the change progressed far enough to take away thought speak, but not far enough to have regular speech. A minute later, she finally answered. "I was trying to focus on timing it right. Besides, we made it didn't we? And what did we lose?"

I made my own transition back to human before answering. "Well, nothing, but only because without any instincts, I couldn't figure out how the Helmacron bodies pee themselves. But metaphorically I wizzed all the way down my leg!"

"Then metaphorically, I'm sorry." Rachel grinned at me. "But wasn't that an amazing rescue?"

"Yes, yes, your boyfriend is wonderful." I muttered before poking her. "And you're not sorry. Don't you forget, I'm still bigger than you right now."

Immediately, Rachel made a face. "How could I forget? How do you deal with being the short one all the time?" She shifted around a bit against the hard talon, both steadying herself and trying to get more comfortable. The ride wasn't exactly smooth.

It was my turn to shrug back at her. "Out of every problem in my life right now, my genetic predisposition toward having to look up people's noses when I talk to them is pretty low on the priority list. If life ever settles down enough that I can worry about that, I'll probably do a little dance." Then I winced. "No, nothing little anymore. Big dance. Giant dance. Dance on stilts. With huge strobe lights."

Tobias's voice interrupted before I could ramble on. (Hold on, ladies, we're heading down to join up with the others.) Then he began a swift, spiraling descent that brought us to a dumpster in an alley. I could see Marco and Jake waiting there, along with Ax in his human morph. Marco closed the lid of the dumpster, giving Tobias a place to land.

As soon as we were down, I scrambled off the talon and shuddered. "I never want to be that close to Visser 3 again." Realizing belatedly that no one except Rachel could hear me, I started to morph into the dog shape to get my thought speak back. A minute later, I repeated myself, then added. (And for the record, whichever Andalite invented this whole 'morphing thought-speak works in every form except human' thing needs to be poked in the eyes.)

Ax jerked his head toward me, and nearly fell over. He's still not used to the whole balance issues that are inherent with the loss of two limbs and a tail. "Eyes? Aye aye aye zuh? Po Po Kuh Poke in the eye-zuh?" He's not used to making mouth sounds either. It makes conversations with him take about three times as long as they should. "Thatuh would hurrrrrr hurt, it would hurt." He worked his mouth a little half silently, experimenting with the faces he could make using the 'hur' sound.

"No one's poking anyone in the eyes, Ax." Jake may have been against the gouging part, but he was certainly rolling his own. "What happened out there?" The latter part was directed at Rachel and me, and his shoulders slumped a little as we explained what had happened on top of the ship and afterward. "Great. David's missing, we don't have either of the ships so we can't fix Rachel or Melissa, and any time now the Howlers are going to show up and start obliterating the human race. Did I miss anything?"

Rachel, who had resumed her bear form, at least partially to spite me for being taller than her as a human right now, shook her furry head. (I think you summed it up, Leaderman.) Then she waved a paw. (Oh, I want to say, Marco has disgusting nose hair.)

Marco started to retort, then his eyes squinted as he lowered his head closer. "You're a bear, you can't see that far."

(Well no.) Rachel admitted. (But then, I didn't say it was a new observation.)

Without looking, Jake reached over and covered Marco's mouth to muffle his comeback. "Girls, just tell us everything you know about the Helmacrons now, everything you saw. Maybe there's something that might tell us how to stop them."

Once more, we explained how the Helmacrons acted. I did most of the explaining on that front, since I'd had the most experience with them. In essence, Rachel covered the general stupidity and I gave them specific examples. We made a good team that way.

When we were done, Marco raised his hand. "Wait, I'm confused. Their so-called Empire is a bunch of ego maniacal females on a power trip that refuse to listen to logic and like to step on the males around them?" He looked to Rachel. "Why didn't they welcome you as their God?"

(Jake.) Rachel said dangerously as she lifted herself onto her hind legs with as much of a glare as her lazy bear eyes could muster.

"Got it." Jake responded, smacking Marco upside the back of the head.

"Oww." Marco rubbed his head, and then shrugged. "Worth it." Sobering, he folded his arms, looming over us like a giant. "So how do we take down these napoleonic ants? Actually, I've been an ant, that's a redundant statement."

Tobias answered, sounding thoughtful. (We need to lure them somewhere, then take them by surprise. Before they can use their shrink thingamajigger on any of us.) He ammended. (Any more of us. We need to convince them to fix Rachel and Melissa. And then make them leave the planet.)

"Is that all?" Marco asked. "I thought you were going to ask us to do something hard, like convince-"

(Marco.) Rachel interrupted. (If my name is anywhere in this next sentence, you will never sleep with both eyes closed again.) Wisely, Marco shut up, lowering his hand.

Ax spoke up then. "It may be posseee... poo see ablah... possiblah... possible to capture one of the Helmacron... cron... croh nun... ships from within. If they do not recognize Rachel and Melissa... lissa... sssaaaa leeesseee yah. Your name is very fun to pronounce... nounce, nouncing nouncey nounce."

(Thanks.) I said, unable to help a slight giggle despite the situation. (I'm glad my name makes your mouth happy.) I paused. (There's something wrong with that sentence, but I'm choosing to ignore it and I hope everyone else shows the same level of maturity. In other words-)

"Got it." Jake responded, immediately covering Marco's mouth before moving on. "Ax, you think that Rachel and Melissa can take over the ship if we get them on it?"

Ax raised both of his shoulders in a shrug that he had picked up from the rest of us. "Yes, Prince Jake. The Helmacrons do not appear to be as militarily adept... ept... depty... doop... adoopety... as even an Andalite Aristh-run training vessel. They should have no serious trouble."

"Yep." Marco managed to say by pulling Jake's hand away. "I don't know about you guys, but that's exactly the word I think of when the Andalite military comes to mind. Adoopety." Then he added after a moment's thought. "Also, slow. Slow's another one."

"Focusing." Jake half ordered and half pleaded. "How do we lure the Helmacron ships somewhere? We could go get Erek or Belle to lead us to them again, but they're just as likely to be with the Yeerks, and we need to get them alone, on our own turf. Where we can step in if anything goes wrong with Rachel and Melissa."

We were all silent for a moment, and then a new voice spoke up. "Well, I could always lead them wherever you want them to go." A normal sized David stood by the side of the dumpster, smirking slightly.

It took us a minute to recover from that surprise. Jake was the first one to manage it, stepping forward with a frown. "David, you're full sized again? How did you..." He trailed off, thinking about it.

"Please, 'Prince' Jake." David said, obviously enjoying this. "Use that tactical brain of yours. Physical me is still about yay tall." He spread his thumb and index finger apart slightly. "But my hologram can be as big as I want it to be."

Jake nodded once to that, stiffly. "Why are you here, David? It's not to help."

"Oh but it is." David spread his arms in a mockingly open and peaceful gesture. "I've come to offer my services. The Helmacrons can track the energy I give off, so I can lure them wherever you want them to go."

Not fooled for a moment, Jake inclined his chin. "And what's in it for you?"

"You never miss a trick, do you, 'Prince' Jake?" David smiled and then grew serious. "You're right, there is something for me. You see, the Chee are always connected through their Chee-Net. So they always know exactly where I am, no matter what I do. They'll know. So here's the deal. I'll help you get Rachel and Melissa back to normal, and get rid of the Helmacrons before the Howlers can show up and destroy the planet. I'll help you save humanity and your friends, and in exchange, you get the Chee to delete the Network from me, so they can never find me. Your choice, Jakey. You can save everyone, but you have to let me go."


	8. Chapter 8

Hey you guys! I have more now. And I'll be finishing this book within this month, for certain. Thanks for being so completely understanding of my time restraints, and I hope some of you are still interested in reading. Real quick though:

lkc159: The Helmacrons are using David's powerful morphing field as a battery for the shrinking power.

Niori: Thank you, I really thought the antagonistic relationship between David and Rachel should have been explored further. Of course, that would have required making David a recurring threat, another problem that I changed this time around.

Mikeb86: Well, we'll see what we can do about getting the Animorphs some fun, shall we?

Ani-maniac494: Thanks! I'm glad you like what's going on with Melissa. And that would be just perfect if the Andalites were eating their greatest defensive weapon, wouldn't it? I hope you like where this chapter leaves off too.

Finally, I promise you guys, there will not be another multi-month wait for the next chapter. It should be out within this next week, if I have anything to say about it. Anyway, enjoy the chapter, I hope. :)

Chapter Eight

Filth and mucus upon the eyes of our bloated and disgusting enemies, oh Powerful and Beloved one. We, your loyal crew of the Almighty Planet Crusher have been delayed by the clumsy and traitorous fools of the ridiculed Galaxy Blaster for too long. Now they have interrupted our Glorious Destruction of these change-capable planet dwellers yet again, and we will no longer stand for it. Let today mark the end of the incompetant Galaxy Blaster cretins, and the beginning of the awe-inspiring rein of the Planet Crusher Conquerors!

- From the log of the Helmacron Ship, Planet Crusher

(Here's a better thought.) Rachel spoke up, her voice low and dangerous. There was no humor here, no banter. She was dead serious. (Why don't we just find your puny little body and squish you like the annoying bug you are?)

David's own voice dripped with dismissive sarcasm. "Yes, by all means, insult and get rid of the one person who can help you save the entire planet. Why don't you do something useful and learn how to cook something while the rest of us chat?"

(Learn how to cook-) Rachel sputtered, heaving herself up once more. I think she might have hurled herself at the hologram, size issues be damned, if Jake hadn't abruptly put his hand down in front of her.

"Rachel, stop." He said tensely. "David, stop. Neither one of you address the other. You want a deal, David, don't say another word to her. You wouldn't come to us unless this is something you really want. So not another word. Rachel, let it go."

Rachel, not being one to let things go easily, protested to Jake. (You can't seriously be thinking of giving him a free pass so he can go do whatever he wants without anyone controlling him.)

"It's not a free pass." Jake said, the tension still in his voice. "The programming still stops him from turning us in, or from doing anything that could put us, or anyone else into direct danger."

(It's letting him go.) Rachel's anger was more of a hot simmer than a boil now. She almost sounded like she was pleading. (After what he did to Jordan. After everything he's done, everything he tried to do... after Cassie. You can't just let him go!)

Jake finally snapped. "I might not have a choice! David is a bastard, but the Howlers are coming, Rachel. And if they get here, it's not a matter of fighting another invasion with a wolf and a tiger. It's death. Everyone dies. You, me, our families, every single person we know, good and bad, will all die. So if I have to give this son of a bitch a little bit of freedom, if I have to swallow back everything in me that wants to wipe the arrogant smirk off his face, just so that everyone we know doesn't have to die, then I'll do it. It isn't about forgetting what he did to Jordan. It's about protecting her, and everyone else from something worse. Even if we don't like it." Jake's voice never faltered, never broke as he continued. "But that's not a choice I can push on anyone else. So no vote. You all made me the leader to make the hard decisions. And I've made this one. If it hurts us in the end, it's no one else's fault. None of you are to blame. It's mine."

It was really only then, in that moment, that I truly understood why Jake was the leader of the Animorphs.

The silence was broken by Marco, who stepped up beside his best friend. Pausing then as their eyes met, he eventually reached out with both arms. At first I thought he was going to hug Jake. Instead, he mimed hoisting a huge, orb shaped object off of Jake's shoulders and onto his own. "Let me just ahh, polish this up for you and get it right back, Atlas."

A tiny smile quirked the very edges of Jake's lips before he shook his head slightly. Then he focused on the hologram of David. "Here's the deal. We tell the Chee the plan. They prepare the programming that will release you from their net. Meanwhile, you lead the Helmacrons to the construction site by the mall. You know the one."

Rachel was still simmering and I couldn't contribute anything to the negotiations, so I nosed up against her, lapping her furry leg once. (I'm sorry, Rachel. I know what you went through to trap him. But he's not really getting out of it. He's still trapped, just left to go around the world and... do whatever. But he can't hurt us.) I kept my thought-speak private, so only Rachel would hear it.

Flopping down once more, I heard the pain in Rachel's voice. (He can't get away with all this. After everything, he can't just walk away and enjoy his life.)

i had no idea what to say to that. What could I tell my friend that would make this better? The boy who had come so close to killing her little sister, and who taken her best friend away from her, was making a deal to be free of a good portion of his prison. Maybe he couldn't hurt us directly, but after everything he had done, and now that it looked like he was simply going to walk off into the sunset on a permanent vacation, maybe he didn't need to.

Finally, I spoke. (I guess what it comes down to, is do you focus more on what happened to Jordan in the past, or what could happen to her in the future?) I felt bad for putting it as bluntly as I did, because the truth was that there was no easy answer. What David had done was evil. It wasn't as simple as dismissing the feelings about what he did so that she could feel better about what we had to do just because there was a good reason for it. A good reason, or in this case, an only choice, didn't erase the fact that Rachel had absolutely every reason to hate David.

She was silent for a long moment. The bear's large paw came up to rest on my back, and I waited. The others were talking and planning, but all I cared about for that brief time was how my friend felt. When Rachel spoke, I could feel the bitterness within the words. (I don't agree with it. He's going to betray us. He's going to hurt us. And Jake's wrong. It won't be on him. It'll be on all of us.) She paused, and at first I thought she was done, but then Rachel continued. (But he made his choice, and I'll follow his lead like a good little soldier.) She didn't say for now. She didn't have to.

By then, the talking had finished. Both of us looked up as Jake spoke. "Right then. Ax, you go with Tobias and find Erek. Tell him what we need. Marco, you're going ape. David, if you want this to work, show yourself and let Marco pick you up. Marco, if he tries anything at all, squish him."

Ax morphed and then he and Tobias took off. Meanwhile, Marco started to change shape, becoming a large, hairy gorilla. David's hologram shrunk down until it was simply a spotlight that illuminated his position, allowing Marco to reach down and pick him up with a disdainful grunt.

Then Jake came over to us. "We'll fix this, you guys. We'll get you both back to your normal size. I promise." He held out his hand, flat against the dumpster. After a moment, Rachel heaved herself up and climbed onto the enormous hand. I followed suit, trotting behind her.

Once we were on Jake's hand, I spoke up. (What are we supposed to do now? And don't tell me we have to go inside anyone's body. Kids getting shrunk down so they can go inside a human body was an overused cliche about three days after television was invented. Please don't Magic Schoolbus us.) I said it as a joke, to ease the tension. I'm gradually realizing how this pre-dangerous battle stuff works.

I think Jake smiled, but it was hard to tell from this vantage point with these eyes. "Don't worry, I won't make you go inside anyone's body. Even my plans don't suck that much." I felt Rachel stir beside me, but she kept silent. Jake continued. "I'm going to put you in my hair so I can morph tiger. Then we'll head for the construction site. David's going to lure the Helmacrons there." He moved his hand up to his hair, letting us step off into the dense brown follicle jungle.

Rachel finally spoke, her voice that already familiar quiver of battle readiness. (And then what, oh fearless General?)

"Then..." Jake answered before I felt the ground shake under my feet as he began the morph. "Then we send these guys packing. There's only room on this planet for one unstoppable alien invasion."

There was a beat, and then I asked, a little more timidly. (You probably meant that to be encouraging, huh?)

Jake, who had fully morphed by this point, leaving Rachel and me stuck in a jungle of orange fur, responded. (Umm. Yes. Sort of. I should try again.)

(No no.) I said, genuinely terrified of what else he might say at this point. (Just take the mulligan and go. Really, I feel totally inspired. Off we go into battle! Hi ho silver! Make it so! Engage! By the power of Greyskull!)

Even as we set out, I heard Marco mutter. (We have got to get our own battle cry, before we end up getting sued for stealing everyone else's.)

It didn't take long to get to the construction site where the original group had found the crashed alien ship that ended up being Elfangor's, which led to all of this. Even though I'm sort of a 'second gen' Animorph, I still feel a connection to this place. So it made sense to bring the new alien invasion here, in our attempt to get rid of them. There was some kind of balance there. Plus you know, it was empty and quiet, which worked well for our purposes.

There was a cement platform, raised just a little bit off the ground and clear of any clutter. That was where Marco had placed David, directly in the middle. Marco himself was a short distance away, half ducked down behind a set of metal beams. At least that's where Jake said he was. I couldn't actually see that far. As for Jake, he was crouched inside a large pipe opposite of the cement.

David sounded bored. "Better hope Erek shows up, Prince Jake. I'm not playing along if I don't get my part of the deal." I was still amazed that someone that small could project a voice that large. When I had said so to Rachel, she had retorted that David's mouth knows no bounds.

(They'll be here, David.) Jake responded tiredly. (Actually, there they are.) I had to take his word for it. Being an inch tall was good for many... for a few... for at least one thing. But it was not good for seeing long distances.

But sure enough, I heard Tobias's voice. (Erek's here, David. You better do your job.) He sounded almost as frustrated with this whole deal as Rachel was. Which I supposed made since, they were kind of-sort of dating or something. It's real hard to pin Rachel down on specifics.

"Oh don't worry, bird boy." David's voice came back. I didn't have to see him to imagine the sneer. "I'm ready. You ready to do your part, big bad robot man?"

Erek's voice was calm. "If it's what must be done to protect this planet from the Howlers, then yes. I'm ready." A moment later he added. "But this sucks."

(It hoovers, dude.) Marco agreed. (But like you said, not letting those things get here is sort of the biggest goal here. So, can you reprogram the jackass so you can't track him by the chee-net?)

"Yes." Erek responded. "It would take only a moment. Are you certain?"

No one responded at first. No one wanted to be responsible for what we might be about to do. Finally, after a long pause, Jake forced the words out. (Do it, Erek. Release him from the net.)

I expected everything to happen at once as soon as Erek said that the job was complete. All he'd had to do was stand there for a moment and access Erek's programming wirelessly. But for over five minutes, nothing happened. David was still standing on the concrete, and the rest of us were still hiding out like kids waiting to yell surprise to a birthday boy that never shows up.

(David.) Rachel growled. (I swear, if this is some kind of trick.)

David didn't bother responding. He didn't need to. At that moment, a spotlight lit him up. or at least it lit up the concrete he was standing on. Jeeze, one of those ships was floating directly above him. We hadn't even heard it come in. The ship immediately began to tractor David in toward them.

(Go!) Rachel shouted. (Get it!)

(Not yet.) Jake responded. (We have to make sure the other one shows up.)

(But they're getting David! They'll have the shrinking power again.) Rachel protested, sounding furious that she couldn't just rush up and smack the ship out of the sky herself.

(I know.) Jake said tensely. (But we're waiting for the other ship. We have to. We need to take them both at once.)

Rachel started to protest, but just then, Marco called out. (Jake, coming in over your shoulder, man!) Almost directly above us, the other ship swooped in. At that exact moment, David disappeared into the first ship's hold. Then the two ships were together.

(Now!) Jake cried out. (Tobias, Ax, go for it! Marco, with me.) Then Rachel and I had to hang on for dear life, half tumbling back through the thick orange jungle of hair as Jake bounded forward. Elsewhere, I could hear a gorilla bellow as Marco charged from the other side. I didn't know where Tobias and Ax were.

Then I saw them both, as Jake landed on one side of the concrete. As I was fighting to keep my teeth clamped around the thick vine of hair, I saw two cockroaches right where David had been standing. (Uhh, is that-?)

(It's them.) Jake responded. Then he shouted up at the ships. (Hey, pimples, you wanna try that shrinking thing over here and see how well it works?) He stopped right near the two cockroaches, while Marco stopped on his other side.

(Jake.) Rachel started. (What in the hell do you think you're doing?)

(Just trust me.) He responded. (I am sixty five percent sure I know what I'm doing.)

(That's a D, Jake.) Marco didn't sound exactly reassured. (You are D level confident in this mission?)

If Jake had shoulders, he would have shrugged. (Think of it as better than average.)

Marco groaned. (We are so doomed. Hey you alien freaks! Do your mumbo jumbo already before we get bored and eat you or something!)

Then the beam appeared. It was familiar by now. As soon as it happened, Rachel yelled. (What the hell kind of plan is this?) Even as she spoke, the ground around us shook and began to get smaller. The two of us were pressed together while the tiger shrunk down. When it was too small to stay on, both of us fell off opposite sides, onto the cement floor. Immediately, both of us demorphed. It had to be close to time for that anyway.

After we finished demorphing, the two ships had already landed. An entire group of the strange looking helmacrons disembarked, all armed for war. Facing them was a tiger, a gorilla, and two human girls, all miniaturized to be about their size. Wait, that was only four. The other two had been... I remembered just as I turned to look around and found myself face to face with a cockroach that was the exact same size as me.

I didn't just scream. I shrieked, flailed my arms, and throw myself backwards to land on my butt. Hey, you try being face to face with a roach as big as you are. If you don't pee yourself a little, you're braver than me and you can have my job. With my blessings.

(Neep Neep!) The lead Helmacron crowed. (See the way the bloated one cowers in terror at our might?) The cry was taken up by the others. (So, fat ones, you surrender yourselves to the might of the Helmacrons!)

(Not quite.) Jake said grimly, stepping forward on all four paws. That got the attention of the celebrating Helmacrons, just as Jake spoke again. (Tobias, Ax?)

(Thought you'd never ask, Bossman.) Tobias replied. Then the roach right behind me and the one near it both began to change. They started to grow.

While all of us sat there dumbfounded, as feathers emerged from one of the roaches and eyestalks from another, Jake continued. (See, I figured your shrink ray thing is a one use thing. It puts whoever you use it on down to your level. Makes your baseline their baseline. But see, the bodies that Tobias and Ax were in were already near your baseline to begin with. So, you might have shaved a few inches off them, but not much. And now you can't hit them again.)

The Helmacrons looked completely dumbfounded. Which pretty much just added the 'founded' to them, but hey. Before they could recover, Jake ordered. (Rachel, Melissa, morph. Marco and I will cover you. Tobias, Ax, don't let their ships take off.)

There was just a little bit of smugness in Jake's voice as he added. (It's time to show the Helmacrons what a real war is.) Then he sprang forward with a roar that was still deafening.

Beside him, following his best friend into battle, Marco commented approvingly. (See, that's a battle speech.)


End file.
